Political geographical perspectives on settler colonialism

Velednitsky, S., Salazar Hughes, S. and Machold, R. (2020) Political geographical perspectives on settler colonialism. Geography Compass, 14(6), e12490. (doi: 10.1111/gec3.12490)

Abstract

Given the centrality of land, territory, and sovereignty to settler colonial formations, it is unsurprising that geographers and other scholars working on such topics are increasingly finding settler colonial studies fruitful in their research agendas. However, work on settler polities in political geography has historically been marked by the present absence of this framework, which has been consequential in terms of circumscribing the kinds of political analysis that geographers can offer. It also limits the nature, depth, and scope of radical critique of violent domination by skirting certain questions about the core drivers of dispossession and responsibility for them. This article examines political geographical engagement (or lack thereof) across each of four themes: population management/governance, territory/sovereignty, consciousness, and narrative, paying particular attention to works which challenge the present absence of settler colonial theory in political geography. We argue that analyzing settler colonial formations as such is essential to conceptualizing their workings and linkages or disjunctures with other forms of empire. Yet this focus also has broader political stakes related to geography's complicity with racialized state power, violence, and empire, as well as and efforts to decolonize the discipline.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Machold, Dr Rhys
• Authors: Velednitsky, S., Salazar Hughes, S., and Machold, R.
• College/School: College of Social Sciences > School of Social and Political Sciences > Politics
• Journal Name: Geography Compass
• Publisher: Wiley
• ISSN: 1749-8198
• ISSN (Online): 1749-8198
• Published Online: 03 March 2020
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2020 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
• First Published: First published in Geography Compass 14(6): e12490
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced in accordance with the copyright policy of the publisher