Genocide on settler frontiers : When hunter-gatherers and commercial stock farmers clash edited by Mohamed Adhikari

ISBN: 9781919895680

University of Cape Town Press, 2014

Paperback, 360 pages

Description

In September 2012, UNESCO held its first ever consultation with member states on the subject of Holocaust and genocide education, recognising the importance of teaching the history of genocide. The aim was to find approaches to raise awareness about the recurrence of mass atrocities and genocide in different environments. It is in this context that Mohamed Adhikari has put together this title, giving perspective to historical European overseas conquests which included many instances of the extermination of indigenous peoples. In cases where invading commercial stock farmers clashed with hunter-gatherers - in southern Africa, Australia and the Americas - the conflict was particularly destructive, often resulting in a degree of dispossession and slaughter that destroyed the ability of these societies to reproduce themselves biologically or culturally. The question of whether this form of colonial conflict was inherently genocidal has not in any systematic way been addressed by scholars until now.
Through chapters written by leading academics, this volume explores the nature of conflict between hunter-gatherers and market-oriented stock farmers in geographically and historically diverse instances, using a wide range of theoretical approaches and comparative studies, which also consider exceptions to the pattern of extermination.