Photography and Colonialism:

Photographs as Support for Racialized “Science”

Brittany Jo Scroggins

Honors Thesis Paper

College of Art & Art History

April 7, 2010

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As a result of the ban of the Transatlantic Slave Trade in the late 19th century,1

Europeans sought alternative methods of gaining economic interest in Africa, particularly

through investing in its interior. The premise behind European imperialism was to colonize the

unexplored African continent and exploit the natural resources with the intent for European

economic growth and prosperity. Consequently, rapid European interest in Africa led to the

Berlin Conference of 1884-85, wherein the continent of Africa was divided into sections, each

belonging to a specific European power, except for the independent states of Liberia and

Ethiopia. The two major colonial powers that emerged as a result of this Scramble for Africa

were France and Britain. While France claimed a majority of Western and Central (Equatorial)

Africa, Britain claimed portions of Central Africa as well, along with a major portion of

Southern Africa. As these European powers began to colonize, they brought with them

technology that ultimately impacted the way in which Africans were viewed by colonists and

other Europeans alike – photography. The implementation of photography provided tangible

support for the growing field of racialized “science” among the colonial powers throughout

Europe.

Scientific racism reached an ultimate high during the late 19th century as Charles

Darwin’s Theory of Evolution took a strong hold with European colonial powers. Darwin’s

theory provided scientific evidence for the “survival of the fittest” and the evolution of man;

therefore, it also provided justification for the racial beliefs of the European imperialists. Within

the beliefs of scientific racism, “scientists assumed that a correlation existed between anatomical

features and mental and psychological traits,” and often overlooked the relationship between

1 Officially the Transatlantic Slave trade was prohibited by the British in 1807, but it continued on until the late 1800s.

Jan Nederveen Pieterse, White on Black: Images of Africa and Blacks in Western Popular Culture. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992), 45.

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human biology and social behavior.2 This type of ethnic stereotyping occurred throughout the

areas under colonial rule during this period – Africa, the Americas, and Asia. Scientists of this

period, “promoted a form of biological determinism…[wherein] the attributes assigned to races,

especially significant social and mental traits, were incorporated, often uncritically, from the

common cultural context. As the historical context was subject to dramatic change in the course

of the nineteenth century, so too was the ideology of race.”3

The ideology of race among the European powers in regards to their African colonies

continued to transform into the 20th century. In particular, “both British and French scientists

generally accepted the premise of African cultural deficiency…[and] also assumed that blacks

belonged to a distinct group, whether characterized as a ‘race’ (subspecies) or a ‘species’.”4 This

belief among British and French scientists was adapted by their contemporaries – the British and

French colonists. They too believed that Africans belonged in a different subspecies or species,

which was further illustrated through the implementation of a new European technology –

photography.5

Photography within British and French African colonies quickly became a concrete

source of evidence for the expanding field of racialized “science” during the late 19th and early

20th centuries. Images from the colonies provided visual evidence for categorization, affirmation

of previous notions and beliefs of the “Other”, and were crucial for the “expansion and

2 Douglas A Lorimer. The Victorians and Race. Ed. Shearer West (Brookfield: Ashgate Publishing Company, 1996), 20.

3 Lorimer, The Victorians and Race, 21. 4 Seymour Drescher. “The Ending of the Slave Trade and the Evolution of European Scientific Racism.” Social Science History, Vol. 14, No. 3. (Autumn, 1990): 427.

5 Photography was invented in 1830. Joanna C Scherer, Anthropology and Photography 1860-1920. ed Elizabeth Edwards. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992), 32.

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maintenance of European colonial power.”6 The way in which photography became a tool for

colonial control and power was that it allowed previous stereotypes to be fulfilled as visual

representations. Therefore through photography, stereotypical beliefs influenced the

representation of subjects within the photographs; photography enabled the transformation of a

subject into what was perceived by Europeans as an object; an object to be categorized, defined

and in essence dominated by the European powers.7

Shortly after the colonization of Africa, a British scientist, Thomas Henry Huxley,

invented ‘Photometic instructions’ for ethnographic anthropologists around the world. Huxley’s

instructions served as guidelines for measuring the human body through photography.8 Figure 1

illustrates the anthropometric poses that were to be used when photographing subjects. The

individuals being photographs were objectified. No longer were these individuals human, but

rather objects that were photographed in the nude up against a measuring scale (Fig. 2).

Fig. 1 ‘Infantile Proportions’ from Jacob de Wit’s Teekenboek der proportion, 1747 9

6 Elizabeth Edwards. Anthropology and Photography 1860-1920. ed. Elizabeth Edwards. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992), 5.

7 Scherer, Anthropology and Photography 1860-1920, 33. 8 Frank Spencer. Anthropology and Photography 1860-1920. ed Elizabeth Edwards. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992), 100-101.

9 Spencer, Anthropology and Photography 1860-1920, 100

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Fig. 2 Anthropometric study. (RAI 1498) 10

The photometric scheme introduced by Huxley was short lived in the late 19th century

because of its physical limitations, and its lack of consistency in scientific results; however, it

provided scientists with enough information to begin the classification of the “Other”, as well as

a stepping stone for the development of other way of anthropometric analysis. In the early 20th

century, ethnographic anthropologists shifted their focus away from capturing Africans in images

that defined the human body’s measurement and began taking photographs that illustrated

Africans within their “natural” environment. This aspect of photography continued throughout

the early 1900s. It was through these types of photographs that the British and French were able

to affirm their beliefs in scientific racism; they were able to illustrate the need for classification

and further preconceived stereotypes through objectification.

The subjects portrayed in photography that was used for justification of scientific racism

differed for the two colonial powers. For the British, a majority of these photographs were taken

in South and Central Africa, focusing in particular on the Kalahari Bushmen and the Batwa

10 Terence White. Anthropology and Photography 1860-1920. ed Elizabeth Edwards. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992), 21.

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people. As for the French, their source of inspiration was the region of the French Congo,

photographing various people and classifying them into ‘races’.

Since the majority of British colonization was concentrated in South Africa, the Kalahari

Bushmen of Namibia became a target group for ethnographic anthropology and scientific racism.

It was amongst the Kalahari Bushman that photography, as well as film, was introduced in order

to capture the “nature” of the “other”. The image of “Dr. Cadle and two average size Kalahari

Bushmen” (Fig. 3) illustrates the continuation of racialized “science” into the 1920s. This

particular photograph depicts two Kalahari boys11 next to Dr. Cadle, an American scientist.12

Dr. Cadle’s outstretched arms provided the proof for Europeans that the Kalahari men

were much smaller in stature and, in essence, support he theory that the Africans were less

evolved as compared to Europeans. In addition the lack of clothes, shoes, and moreover a pithe

helmet, provided Europeans in the early 20th century with the illusion that the Kalahari Bushmen

were not as scientifically advanced as themselves. The images that emerged from the studying

of the Kalahari in Namibia eventually led to a film in the 1930s, The Wild Men of Kalahari,

wherein the views of racialized “science” were continually expressed. The Bushmen were seen

as individuals who still made metals like in the Stone Age and were considered the most

treacherous creatures on earth.13

11 The young Kalahari men in the image are suspected to between the ages of 7 and 8.

The Wild Men of the Kalahari, 30m, produced by C. Ernest Cadle, 1930. 12 Dr. Cadle was an American scientist who traveled with the British and “Hottentot” (South African women) guides

in order to document footage for completing a film on the Kalahari Bushmen. Robert J. Gordon “’Captured on Film’: Bushmen and the Claptrap of Performative Primitives.” In Images and Empires: Visuality in Colonial and Postcolonial Africa. Edited by Paul S. Landau and Deborah D. Kaspin. (Berkely: University of California Press, 2002), 417.

13 The Wild Men of the Kalahari, 30m, produced by C. Ernest Cadle, 1930.

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Fig. 3 “Dr. Cadle and two average size Kalahari Bushmen.”

Also titled “Cadle and Kung Bushmen.” Photo by C. L. H. Hahn. No. A11, 1927 14

The racist depictions of the Kalahari Bushmen were justified by anthropological

photography during the late 1920s; however, this type of justification for scientific racism did

not emerge during the 1920s, but rather developed in proceeding years through other

photographic studies. Some of the anthropological studies that occurred during the early 20th

century focused on the indigenous people of the Congo.

Despite the fact that Britain never colonized the Congo region of Central Africa, there

were British missionaries and explorers who investigated this region. Lt-Col. James J. Harrison

was one of the individuals who traveled to the Congo region in 1905. Upon his return brought

back a group of Batwa pygmies from the Ituri forest of the Congo.15 Although the photographs

of the Batwa were taken in London, rather than in Central Africa, the same principles of

scientific racism were applied (Fig. 4). The views torward the Batwa were surrounded by social

evolution and race. “The pygmies were portrayed as childlike…not simply a reference to their

size but part of a larger conceptualization of the evolution of mankind, on the analogy of

individual development from child to adult…they [pygmies] were supposed to be of the lowest 14 Gordon, Images and Empires: Visuality in Colonial and Postcolonial Africa, 417. 15 Brian Street. Anthropology and Photography 1860-1920. ed Elizabeth Edwards. (New Haven: Yale University

Press, 1992), 126.

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type, mentally as well as the smallest, physically of the human race” (Fig. 5).16 The Batwa

peoples in London illustrated that the views of scientific racism amongst the British extended

well beyond the opinions of those explorers and/or scientists taking the photographs with the

interior of Africa.

Fig. 4 Studio portrait of Batwa pygmies. Fig. 5 Anthropometric study of Batwa man. Photograph by W.N. Downey (RAI 35829)177 Photograph by W.N. Downey. (RAI 1790) 18

The images from the French Congo also provided an illustration of how the views of the

photographers and explorers in African transferred from the colonies back to France. The

medium that was used by the French photographers to capture racialized “science” within the

colonies was postcards. “Postcards showing ‘native types’ had anthropological overtones, for

the publishers realized that they could profitably appeal to the passion for exoticism, and often

eroticism, under the guise of scientific knowledge.”19 Many of the images used on the postcards

during the early 20th century were those taken by French colonial photographer, Jean Audema.

16 Street, Anthropology and Photography 1860-1920, 127. 17 Street, Anthropology and Photography 1860-1920, 128. 18 Street, Anthropology and Photography 1860-1920, 129. 19 David MacDougall. The Corporeal Image: Film, Ethnography, and the Senses. (Princeton: Princeton University

Press, 2006), 178.

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Audema borrowed elements of Huxley’s anthropometric style, while simultaneous applying

contemporary notions of social evolution though the depiction of physical characteristics.20

Although Audema did not use a measuring stick to evaluate the physical characteristics

like Huxley, it can be inferred that the positioning his subjects in frontal and side positions

alluded to elements of scientific racism. The following are images are photographs taken by

Audema of Congolese men, women, children, and families from various ethnic groups within the

French Congo.21 Each individual was positioned in a variation of anthropometric style; some

individuals posed in profile, while others stood directly facing the camera.

Even though Audema modeled his style of photography after Huxley’s anthropometric

approach to photography by using profile and frontal poses, he was also interested in achieving

balance within his composition. In order to achieve this balance, Audema often incorporated

weapons along with the human form – spears, shields, knifes, rifles,– to provided diagonals and

vertical lines within a photograph.22 The aesthetic balance Audema tried to achieve within his

images was often overshadowed by the fact that the images communicated and illustrated aspects

of racialized “science.” Weapons and ‘savage’ objects only furthered stereotypical impressions

of the ‘other’. Therefore, “photography…emerged as a “scientific” mode of representing human

types. As racial ideologues accommodated Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution to their ways

of thinking, the concerns of physical anthropology were joined to the power of photography in

order visually to “type” indigenes in…Africa.”23

20 MacDougall. The Corporeal Image: Film, Ethnography, and the Senses, 179. 21 Figures 7-21: Source: Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of African Art, Eliot Elisofon Photographic

Archives Online Catalog <http://africa.si.edu/research/archives.html/> (accessed 12 April 2008) 22 MacDougall. The Corporeal Image: Film, Ethnography, and the Senses, 185. 23 Paul S. Landau. “Empires of the Visual: Photography and Colonial Administration in Africa.” In Images and

Empires: Visuality in Colonial and Postcolonial Africa. ed. Paul S Landau and Deborah D. Kaspin (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002), 145.

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It is through this transformation of the colonial images into postcards that the notion of

scientific racism is further exemplified because of two specific elements: the accessibility to the

common European and the text and descriptions that accompanied the images. The descriptions

of images that already exemplified anthropometric measurements were further filled with racist

beliefs wherein individuals were turned into specimens and objectified.24

The weapons, lack of clothing, and body modification all emphasized the ‘savage’ quality

and lack of evolutionary advancement among these individuals. In addition, the exposure of

women as bare breasted specimens also brought along negative connotations in regards to race

among European viewers. Secondly, the descriptions by Audema that accompanied the

postcards did not emphasize the Congolese cultures, but that stereotypically identified the images

a “young warrior” or a “woman wearing bones necklaces” (Fig. 7).

The final aspect of scientific racism that was exemplified by the photographs and

postcards of Audema was seen through the images of displaying architecture. Figure 11

illustrates the habitat and living environment for some indigenous people of the Congo region, in

particular the Yakmo village. The thatched roofs and wood-like façade exemplify its ephemeral

qualities. In comparison, the quarters consisted of French Colonial office of the Governor of

Brazzaville (Congo) (Fig 12) which was a large, two story, and permanent structure that

resembled a building that would be built in France in the early 20th century. Therefore, the

difference exemplified between these two postcards, conveyed the message that the Africans

living in the French Congo were indeed interior and less evolutionarily advanced because they

lack the technology or intellectual capability to construct more “permanent” structures.

24 MacDougall. The Corporeal Image: Film, Ethnography, and the Senses, 179.

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Fig.7 'French Congo. Andassa warrior - Niari region.'' Fig. 8 'French Congo Kotto''. Left profile of a young warrior with a goatee. Young women wearing cache-sexe made of Congo Français. Photograph by J. Audema, 1905, 9x14 cm beads, holding her child on her right hip.

Congo Français. Photograph by J. Audema, 1905, 9x14 cm

Fig. 9 ''French Congo. Pandé child Fig. 10 'French Congo. N'Goundis - Nola (Upper-Sangha)''. Young boy with necklace (Upper-Sangha). Young boy sitting in the and piercing in his left nostril wearing a ground in the front row, women wearing cache-sexe. Congo Français necklaces in the second row and, third row, Photograph by J. Audema, 1905, 9x14 cm men holding spears. Congo Français.

Photograph by J. Audema, 1905, 9x14 cm

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Fig. 11 'French Congo. Yakoma village on the Oubanghi''. Fig 12 French Congo. Office of the governor general In the foreground, village people in the background, cabins. in Brazzaville''. Alley leading to the colonial house. Congo Français. Photograph by J. Audema, 1905, 9x14 cm French flag in the rooftop. Congo Français.

Photograph by J. Audema, 1905, 9x14 cm

The invention of photography in the late 19th century helped solidify an era of scientific

racism through Europe. Photographs provided tangible images from the British and French

colonies – images that portrayed ideas of race according to these colonial powers. The colonial

photographs from South and Central Africa these imperial powers with the notion of authority,

classification, and the justification for preconceived stereotypes about Africans. Therefore, “

‘Western perception of the “Other” ’ [was] central to the creation and consumption of

photography in the second half of the nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth centuries.”25

The use of photography by the British and French during African colonization, further

exemplified European beliefs in scientific racism. The photographs, whether displayed as actual

photographs or postcards, were material objects that were both tactile and physical, resembling a

real person or thing, thus enabling Europeans to reaffirm their beliefs of scientific racism through

photographs that linked sensory registers beyond the visual perceptions.26

Photography allowed Europeans to classify, fulfill preconceived stereotypes of Africans,

and exert their colonial power to the fullest. One advantage, however that resulted from the

25 Elizabeth Edwards. Anthropology and Photography 1860-1920. ed. Elizabeth Edwards. (New Haven: Yale

University Press, 1992), 5. 26 Elizabeth Edwards. Getting Pictures Right: Context and Interpretation. ed. Amichael Albrecht, Viet Arlt, Barber

Müller, and Jürg Schneider. (Köln: Rüdiger Köppe Verlag, 2004), 16.

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introduction of photography into the colonies, was that photography today has become a means

of expression for Africans. No longer are Africans living in a colonial era where the Congolese

are subject to being judged and measured at the discretion of European powers. Rather, today

artists, such as Jean Depara in the Democratic Republic of the Congo have had the opportunity to

portray their view of society through their own implementation of photography (Fig. 22-23).27

Fig. 22 Jean Depara, Adultère, ca 1960 Fig. 23 Jean Depara, Photographie

africaine caractéistique de la mise en valeur des textiles, R.D. Congo, ca 1960

27 Anne-Marie Bouttiaux and others, L’Afrique par elle-même: un siècie de photographie africanie. (Tervuren:

Musée royal de l’Afrique centrale, 2003), 145-46.

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L’Afrique par elle-même: un siècie de photographie africanie. Tervuren: Musée royal de

l’Afrique centrale, 2003.

Anne-Marie Bouttiaux and other provide an compilation of images from contemporary

African artists (1954-present). Although the book is in French it provides enough

translation that it is possible to decipher the region and time period of the contemporary

African artists.

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Racism.” Social Science History, Vol. 14, No. 3. (Autumn, 1990): 415-450.

Drescher focuses particularly on the development of scientific racism in relation to both

the British and the French.

Edwards, Elizabeth, ed. Anthropology and Photography 1860-1920. New Haven: Yale

University Press, 1992.

Edwards examines early contact between Europeans and Africans during the late 19th and

early 20th century through photography. She takes into account the preconceived theories

of race, as well as the expansion of European colonial power, in her analysis. This source

contains multiple images related to ‘racialized’ science.

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Edwards, Elizabeth. Getting Pictures Right: Context and Interpretation. Edited by Amichael

Albrecht, Viet Arlt, Barber Müller, and Jürg Schneider. Köln: Rüdiger Köppe Verlag,

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Getting Pictures Right: Context and Interpretation provides a detailed analysis of

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Considerations.” History in Africa, Vol. 13. (1986): 89-116.

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century. He also explores the uses of these photographs in European societies as well.

The document does not contain images that are useful for the research.

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In Images and Empires: Visuality in Colonial and Postcolonial Africa. Edited by Paul S.

Landau and Deborah D. Kaspin, 212-232. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002.

Gordon, through photography, focuses on the fabrication of the ‘Bushman tourist show’

by the Northern Cape Tourist association in the early 20th century. The article contains

an image of the ‘racialized’ science by Europeans on page 217.

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Jenkins and Geary discuss the collection of African photographs in the Basel Mission

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Jenkins, in this article, particularly focuses on photography and European missionary

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Landau and Deborah D. Kaspin. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002.

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Africa by the Europeans (145). He explores the relation between photography and

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Lorimer, Douglas A. The Victorians and Race. Edited by Shearer West. Brookfield: Ashgate

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Pieterse focuses on images and power by examining the ‘social rhetoric’ of images.

Chapters 4 and 5, contain western images of Africa, beginning in the early 19th century.

The Wild Men of the Kalahari, 30m, produced by C. Ernest Cadle, 1930.