Date of Award

Summer 2008

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

History

Committee Director

Maura Hametz

Committee Member

Jane Merritt

Committee Member

Kathy Pearson

Call Number for Print

Special Collections LD4331.H47 W44 2008

Abstract

The nineteenth century was an age of travel. The English traveled the globe for a variety of reasons. When not traveling for military, political, religious, or scientific reasons, they also traveled a great deal simply for pleasure. Regardless of reason, travel brought the English into contact with the Other. As a construction, the Other became an important part of English identity.

Englishwomen were particularly famous for travel. Although they were disenfranchised Others themselves in English society, Englishwomen did not identify with the Other they encountered in travels, but rather chose enfranchisement in an elite "imagined" England. This community (or the middle/upper class idea of English identity, purpose, and destiny) was solidified through compartmentalizing the Other.

Travel writing was extremely significant to the construction of English identity because it influenced non-travelers (fellow members of the "imagined" England) and provided them with a foundation on which to base their vision of English identity, purpose, and destiny. Because the Other was by nature something foreign or unknown, it had to be packaged carefully, in a way that reinforced rather than threatened the England "imagined" by travelers and their readers.

Rights

In Copyright. URI: http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).

DOI

10.25777/exaf-0195

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