{"product_id":"empire-and-underworld-captivity-in-french-guiana-9780674057548","title":"Empire and Underworld  Captivity in French Guiana","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe French Revolution invented the notion of the citizen, but it also invented the noncitizen—the person whose rights were nonexistent. The South American outpost of Guiana became a depository for these outcasts of the new French citizenry, and an experimental space for the exercise of new kinds of power and violence against marginal groups.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis striking, original, and very intelligent book is concerned with a vast theme: the contrast between the principles of 1789 (liberty, equality, fraternity) and the realities of the lives of deportees in Guiana. In an age concerned with human rights, this book is of universal relevance. These pages may seem to be about the heart of colonial darkness in a far away place, but they are in fact about the heart of darkness in France itself. -- Patrice Higonnet, Harvard University\u003cbr\u003eThis sophisticated study illuminates the history of French Guiana and enriches our understanding of the intertwined histories of France and the Caribbean. Braiding together vivid narratives of exile and imprisonment with detailed legal history, Spieler brilliantly analyzes the complexities of the French colonial order. -- Laurent Dubois, Duke University\u003cbr\u003eIn this provocative book, we learn how the juridical order of a nation—even a democratic one—can create an administrative space which definitively erased its inhabitants from the civil sphere. In French Guiana, \u003ci\u003eémigrés\u003c\/i\u003e from the French Revolution, then slaves and ex-slaves, deported convicts and indentured workers were rendered invisible before the law. Inspired by the Australian and the Algerian experiences and also by Catholic and Socialist utopias, this process required juridical imagination as well as the ambiguities of empire. While set in nineteenth-century colonial France, Spieler's powerfully illuminating story has deep relevance for today's world. -- Jean M. Hébrard, École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales","brand":"Harvard University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49403547222359,"sku":"9780674057548","price":43.31,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9780674057548.jpg?v=1730483789","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/empire-and-underworld-captivity-in-french-guiana-9780674057548","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}