The French Imperial Nation-State: Negritude and Colonial Humanism between the Two World Wars

by Gary Wilder

France experienced a period of crisis following World War I when the relationship between the nation and its colonies became a subject of public debate. The French Imperial Nation-State focuses on two intersecting movements that redefined imperial politics—colonial humanism led by administrative reformers in West Africa and the Paris-based Negritude project, comprising African and Caribbean elites.

Gary Wilder develops a sophisticated account of the contradictory character of colonial government and examines the cultural nationalism of Negritude as a multifaceted movement rooted in an alternative black public sphere. He argues that interwar France must be understood as an imperial nation-state—an integrated sociopolitical system that linked a parliamentary republic to an administrative empire. An interdisciplinary study of colonial modernity combining French history, colonial studies, and social theory, The French Imperial Nation-State will compel readers to revise conventional assumptions about the distinctions between republicanism and racism, metropolitan and colonial societies, and national and transnational processes.

Genres: History, Politics, Nonfiction

352 pages, Hardcover

First published December 1, 2005

About the author

Gary Wilder is Associate Professor of Anthropology at The Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He is the author of The French Imperial Nation-State: Negritude and Colonial Humanism between the Two World Wars.

Reviews

[Jehnie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book problematizes an extremely important era of French history - the 1920s and 30s. It takes two different genres within the field, imperialism and defining the nation-state, and combines them in a way that brings together disparate unconnected themes. I would have liked to read it in greater detail, but what can ya do?