Whilst I was doing some research in colonial-era magazines, I stumbled across this 1930s advert in to: te’ yei: (progress) magazine for a book promising to teach people the skill of hypnotism. Costing just three rupees, the seller generously offered to refund any purchaser who found that they could not ‘master the science’. Learning hypnotism—or,…
Month: May 2015
Traffic Accidents and Structural Power
Re-reading the colonial judge Maurice Collis’ memoirs, Trials in Burma (1938), got me thinking about the history of traffic accidents. The final case that he discusses—the case that marked the beginning of the end to his career in the colony—hints at how traffic accidents could be understood as an expression of white privilege. The particular…
Colonizing Animals 