Imperial Contagions Medicine, Hygiene, and Cultures of Planning in Asia

Europeans in Asia developed powerful anxieties about contagion and made many plans to keep it at a safe distance. Commercial ventures depended on mobility of people and goods, yet for the personal safety of their members, the Europeans in Asia wished to stabilize and control the spaces they inhabited and the behaviors of those around them. By exploring the tensions and contradictions that arose from these efforts to stay safe, the authors -- among the best authorities now writing -- offer not only fascinating accounts of historical events but fresh views of the processes often termed colonial or imperial. -- Harold J. Cook, author of Matters of Exchange: Commerce, Medicine, and Science in the Dutch Golden Age This substantial collection greatly enriches our understanding of medicine, disease, and policy in colonial Asia. The contributors, from a range of disciplines, grapple fruitfully with questions surrounding medical space and the shift from enclavism to public health. In doing so, they make important theoretical and empirical contributions to medical and imperial history. -- David Arnold, author of Colonizing the Body: State Medicine and Epidemic Disease in Nineteenth-Century India