Child, nation, race and empire: Child rescue discourse, England, Canada and Australia, 1850–1915 (Studies in Imperialism)

By: Margot Hillel and Shurlee Swain

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Synopsis: Child, nation, race and empire is an innovative, inter-disciplinary, cross cultural study that contributes to understandings of both contemporary child welfare practices and the complex dynamics of empire. It analyses the construction and transmission of nineteenth-century British child rescue ideology. Locating the origins of contemporary practice in the publications of the prominent English Child rescuers, Dr Barnardo, Thomas Bowman Stephenson, Benjamin Waugh, Edward de Montjoie Rudolf and their colonial disciples and literature written for children, it shows how the vulnerable body of the child at risk came to be reconstituted as central to the survival of nation, race and empire. Yet, as the shocking testimony before the many official enquiries into the past treatment of children in out-of-home ‘care’ held in Britain, Ireland, Australia and Canada make clear, there was no guarantee that the rescued child would be protected from further harm.