Colonial Continuities and Decoloniality in the French-Speaking World
From Nostalgia to Resistance
Published on 3. October 2025
Book
Paperback/Softback
328 pages
978-1-83624-557-5 (ISBN)
Description
This volume pays tribute to the work of Professor Kate Marsh (1974-2019), an outstanding scholar whose research covered an extraordinarily wide range of interests and approaches, encompassing the history of empire, literature, politics and cultural production across the Francophone world from the eighteenth to the twenty-first century. Each of the chapters within engages with a different aspect of Marsh's interest in French colonialism and the entanglements of its complex afterlives - whether it be her interest in the longevity of imperial rivalries; loss and colonial nostalgia; exoticism and the female body; decolonization and the ends of empire; the French colonial imagination; the policing of racialized bodies; or anti-colonial activism and resistance. As well as reflecting the geographical and intellectual breadth of Marsh's research, the volume demonstrates how her work continues to resonate with emerging scholarship around decoloniality, transcolonial mobilities and anti-colonial resistance in the Francophone world. From French India to Algeria and from the Caribbean to contemporary France, this collection demonstrates the persistent relevance of Marsh's scholarship to the histories and legacies of empire, while opening up conversations about its implications for decolonial approaches to imperial histories and the future of Francophone Postcolonial Studies.
Reviews / Votes
'As an interdisciplinary series the collection features literary commentary, art inspired by colonial connections, and historical examples of repression; it encompasses a variety of scholarly fields. By illustrating the impact of colonial thought through both literary and socio-historical examples, Colonial Continuities is a striking way of honoring the late Kate Marsh.' Hope Hecht, The French ReviewMore details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Liverpool
United Kingdom
Illustrations
1 Illustrations, color
Dimensions
Height: 234 mm
Width: 156 mm
ISBN-13
978-1-83624-557-5 (9781836245575)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Sarah Arens is a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow and Lecturer in French at the University of Liverpool. Nicola Frith is a Senior Lecturer in French and Francophone Studies at the University of Edinburgh. Jonathan Lewis is a Lecturer in French and Francophone Studies at Bangor University. Rebekah Vince is a Lecturer in French at Queen Mary University of London.
Content
Illustrations
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Sarah Arens, Nicola Frith, Jonathan Lewis and Rebekah Vince
I. Colonial Continuities and Nostalgia
Bayaderes in the French Imagination: A Persistent Dance
Tessa Ashlin Nunn
Jean-Paul Kauffmann: Nostalgia, Empire and Imagined Resurrections
Patrick Crowley
A Russian Love Affair: Memory, Nostalgia and Transimperial Connections
Srilata Ravi
Colonialism, Race and Caribbean Migration: A History of the BUMIDOM
Antonia Wimbush
Continuity or Rupture?: Remapping the End of Empire in Marguerite Duras's 'Cycle Indien'
Julia Waters
The Visible Other: Muslim Women, Feminism, and National Identity in France
Edwige Crucifix
Bridge
Slaves of Fashion. Les Indiennes: The Extended Triangle
The Singh Twins
II. Decoloniality and Transcolonial Modes of Resistance
Hidden Heritages and Unlikely Legacies: An Eastern Jerusalem in Hubert Haddad's Premieres neiges sur Pondichery
Rebekah Vince
Decolonizing Collective Memory from within: Rwandan Remembrance in Belgium and France
Catherine Gilbert
Divided Worlds, Distorted Selves: Coloniality and the Process of Identification in
Yasmina Khadra's Ce que le jour doit a la nuit
Abdelbaqi Ghorab
The Enslaved Man in Un Coeur simple: A Story within a Story
Sucheta Kapoor
Mobility, Immobility and Transgression: Representations of Dangerous Travellers
in Mounsi's La Noce des fous
Jonathan Lewis
Policing Black Anti-Colonial Activism in Interwar France: The Surveillance of
Lamine Senghor in Frejus, Marseille and Bordeaux
David Murphy
Afterword
Charles Forsdick
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Sarah Arens, Nicola Frith, Jonathan Lewis and Rebekah Vince
I. Colonial Continuities and Nostalgia
Bayaderes in the French Imagination: A Persistent Dance
Tessa Ashlin Nunn
Jean-Paul Kauffmann: Nostalgia, Empire and Imagined Resurrections
Patrick Crowley
A Russian Love Affair: Memory, Nostalgia and Transimperial Connections
Srilata Ravi
Colonialism, Race and Caribbean Migration: A History of the BUMIDOM
Antonia Wimbush
Continuity or Rupture?: Remapping the End of Empire in Marguerite Duras's 'Cycle Indien'
Julia Waters
The Visible Other: Muslim Women, Feminism, and National Identity in France
Edwige Crucifix
Bridge
Slaves of Fashion. Les Indiennes: The Extended Triangle
The Singh Twins
II. Decoloniality and Transcolonial Modes of Resistance
Hidden Heritages and Unlikely Legacies: An Eastern Jerusalem in Hubert Haddad's Premieres neiges sur Pondichery
Rebekah Vince
Decolonizing Collective Memory from within: Rwandan Remembrance in Belgium and France
Catherine Gilbert
Divided Worlds, Distorted Selves: Coloniality and the Process of Identification in
Yasmina Khadra's Ce que le jour doit a la nuit
Abdelbaqi Ghorab
The Enslaved Man in Un Coeur simple: A Story within a Story
Sucheta Kapoor
Mobility, Immobility and Transgression: Representations of Dangerous Travellers
in Mounsi's La Noce des fous
Jonathan Lewis
Policing Black Anti-Colonial Activism in Interwar France: The Surveillance of
Lamine Senghor in Frejus, Marseille and Bordeaux
David Murphy
Afterword
Charles Forsdick