Title French women and the empire : the case of Indochina / Marie-Paule Ha

Published Oxford, United Kingdom : Oxford University Press, 2014

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Description 1 online resource (283 pages) : illustrations, 1 map Contents Searching for Mme Donnadieu- researching French colonial women's history -- Gender, migration, and Empire -- Mission Civilisatrice au Féminin: the colonial feminine mystique and the white woman's burden -- Promoting emigration to Indochina -- Franc̦ais d'Indochine -- Poor, white, single, and female in the colony -- A class of their own: professional Coloniales -- Imperial homemaking -- Conclusion Summary This investigation of colonial gender politics in Third Republic France, using Indochina as a case study, charts women's experiences and activities to reveal a transformation in French views of empire: from colonial life as an exclusively male preserve to one where women's presence was seen as essential "French Women and the Empire is the first book-length investigation of colonial gender politics in Third Republic France, using Indochina as a case study. Its departure point is the interrogation of the dramatic change in the French colonialist view of the empire as an exclusively male preserve where women feared to tread. At the turn of the century, a reverse discourse emerged in the metropole, forcefully arguing that colonial female emigration was essential to 'true' colonisation.The study begins by analysing the highly complex web of interconnected factors underlying this radical transformation in the representation of the empire from being a 'no woman's land' into a 'woman's haven.' Then, drawing on a large body of hitherto little examined sources, the study continues by reconstructing the experiences and activities of French women in Indochina from the fin-de-siècle to the interwar era. The most significant finding from this study is that contrary to the image propagated by promotional literature of the colonial woman as essentially a bourgeois homemaker, the class and ethnic make-up of the French female population in the Asian colony was in fact remarkably heterogeneous, with a sizeable contingent of them, married or single, actively engaging in a variety of paid employment outside the home. By thus foregrounding the diversity and complexity of colonial female experiences, French Women and the Empire seeks to move the story of French women and the empire beyond the narrow confines of the imperial family romance to the wider arena of the colonial public sphere."-- Provided by publisher Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index Notes Online resource; title from home page (viewed on May 20, 2014) Subject Women colonists -- Indochina -- History Women -- Indochina -- Social conditions -- 20th century French -- Indochina -- Social conditions -- 20th century Colonization -- History Women colonists Colonization French -- Social conditions Women -- Social conditions SUBJECT Indochina -- History. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85065717 France -- History -- Third Republic, 1870-1940. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85051411 Subject France Indochina Genre/Form Electronic books History Form Electronic book ISBN 9780191754265 0191754269 0191662739 9780191662737

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