Vestiges of the colonial empire in France : monuments, museums, and colonial memories

This book offers the first comprehensive study of 'sites of memory' in France connected to the history of French imperialism and colonialism, and the ways that the French have remembered or forgotten their colonial past. Through a study of monuments, memorials, museum collections and other 'sites of memory' in France connected with France's overseas empire this book analyzes the way in which French authorities marked the Paris and provincial landscapes with these reminders of France's colonial 'mission' during the period of imperial expansion, and the fate of these sites in the post-colonial period and what that evolution reveals about French memory and amnesia of the colonial epoch. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, when 'Greater France' encompassed the world's second largest overseas empire, public authorities and private lobby groups used monuments to great men, memorials to soldiers killed in battle, museums and simple street names to imprint colonialism on the landscape. Such reminders were intended to consecrate France's colonial vocation and to stimulate support for imperialism. In the post-colonial era, these traces of empire remain as 'sites of memory'. This study examines sites in Paris and the provinces, from old statues of colonial worthies to a new memorial to soldiers killed in Algeria. It argues that monuments and museums, initially intended to mark the country with colonialist fervour, now testify to ambivalent French views of colonialism and show painful, sometimes reluctant and often ambiguous attempts to come to terms with the colonial past. Vestiges of imperialism are thus linked to collective memory and to contemporary issues of national identity Cover......Page 1 Contents......Page 6 List of Illustrations......Page 7 List of Abbreviations......Page 8 Preface......Page 9 Introduction: Sites of Colonial Memory......Page 12 1 The Colonies in Paris......Page 32 2 The Colonies in the Provinces......Page 87 3 Colonial War Memorials......Page 116 4 Of Men and Monuments......Page 168 5 The Colonies in Museums......Page 207 6 The Colonial Legacy of Non-Western Art in French Museums......Page 256 7 Temporary Exhibitions: Changing Perspectives......Page 302 Conclusion: The Future of the Colonial Past......Page 339 Notes......Page 346 Bibliography......Page 376 Index......Page 388

This book offers the first comprehensive study of "sites of memory" in France connected to the history of French imperialism and colonialism, and the ways that the French have remembered or forgotten their colonial past. Through a study of monuments, museum collections and other "sites of memory" this book analyzes the way in which French authorities marked the Paris and provincial landscapes with these reminders of France's colonial "mission", the fate of these sites in the post-colonial period, and what that evolution reveals about French memory of the colonial epoch.

"This study examines sites in Paris and the provinces from old statues of colonial worthies to a new memorial to soldiers killed in Algeria. It argues that monuments and museums, initially intended to mark the country with colonialist fervour, now testify to ambivalent French views of colonialism and show painful sometimes reluctant and often ambiguous attempts to come to terms with the colonial past. Vestiges of imperialism are thus linked to collective memory and to contemporary issues of national identity."--Jacket