God's Arbiters

Americans and the Philippines, 1898-1902
Erscheinungsjahr 2013
ISBN: 978-0-19-930720-3
Verlag: Oxford University Press

Buch, Englisch, Band 6, 288 Seiten, Format (B × H): 156 mm x 234 mm, Gewicht: 494 g

Reihe: Imagining the Americas

When the U.S. liberated the Philippines from Spanish rule in 1898, the exploit was hailed at home as a great moral victory, an instance of Uncle Sam freeing an oppressed country from colonial tyranny. The next move, however, was hotly contested: should the U.S. annex the archipelago? The disputants did agree on one point: that the United States was divinely appointed to bring democracy--and with it, white Protestant culture--to the rest of the world. They were, in the words of U.S. Senator Albert Beveridge, "God's arbiters," a civilizing force with a righteous role to play on the world stage.

Mining letters, speeches, textbooks, poems, political cartoons and other sources, Susan K. Harris examines the role of religious rhetoric and racial biases in the battle over annexation. She offers a provocative reading both of the debates' religious framework and of the evolution of Christian national identity within the U.S. The book brings to life the personalities who dominated the discussion, figures like the bellicose Beveridge and the segregationist Senator Benjamin Tillman. It also features voices from outside U.S. geopolitical boundaries that responded to the Americans' venture into global imperialism: among them England's "imperial" poet Rudyard Kipling, Nicaragua's poet/diplomat Rubén Darío, and the Philippines' revolutionary leaders Emilio Aguinaldo and Apolinario Mabini. At the center of this dramatis personae stands Mark Twain, an influential partisan who was, for many, the embodiment of America. Twain had supported the initial intervention but quickly changed his mind, arguing that the U.S. decision to annex the archipelago was a betrayal of the very principles the U.S. claimed to promote.

Written with verve and animated by a wide range of archival research, God's Arbiters reveals the roots of current debates over textbook content, evangelical politics, and American exceptionalism-shining light on our own times as it recreates the culture surrounding America's global mission at the turn into the twentieth century.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Harris, Susan K.

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Geschichte einzelner Länder Asiatische Geschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Geschichte einzelner Länder Amerikanische Geschichte
• Sozialwissenschaften Ethnologie | Volkskunde Ethnologie Kultur- und Sozialethnologie: Politische Ethnologie, Recht, Organisation, Identität
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Kultur- und Ideengeschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Postkoloniale Geschichte, Nationale Befreiung und Unabhängigkeit

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction: A Christian Nation
Section I: American Narratives
Chapter 1: Citizenship and the Philippine Debates: The Religious Factor
Chapter 2: Citizenship and the Philippine Debates: The Racial Factor
Section II: Creating Citizens
Chapter 3: A Connecticut Yankee in the Philippines
Chapter 4: The National Christian
Section III: The Eyes of the World
Chapter 5: "The White Man's Burden," the Philippines, and the Anglo-
American Alliance
Chapter 6: "Saxon Eyes and Barbaric Souls": Non-Anglo Responses
to the American Annexation of the Philippines
Chapter 7: Noli Me Tangere: Filipino Responses to Annexation

Über Autor(innen)

Susan K. Harris is the Joyce and Elizabeth Hall Distinguished Professor of American Literature and Culture at The Univerversity of Kansas.