University of British Columbia Press
Westward Bound
Sex, Violence, the Law, and the Making of a Settler Society
Distributed for University of British Columbia Press
Westward Bound
Sex, Violence, the Law, and the Making of a Settler Society
WestwardBound debunks the myth of Canada’s peaceful West and the masculine conceptions of law and violence upon which it rests by shifting the focus from Mounties and whisky traders to criminal cases involving women between 1886 and 1940. Erickson’s analysis of these cases shows that, rather than a desire to protect, official responses to the most intimate or violent acts betrayed an impulse to shore up the liberal order by maintaining boundaries between men and women, Native people and newcomers, and capital and labour. Victims and accused could only hope to harness entrenched ideas about masculinity, femininity, race, and class in their favour. This fascinating exploration of hegemony and resistance in key contact zones draws prairie Canada into larger debates about law, colonialism, and nation building.
Table of Contents
Foreword
Introduction
1 Fruitful Land, Happy Homes, Manly Titans: Settlement Frontiers, Law, and the Intimate in Colonialism and Nation Building
2 They Know No Better: Maintaining Race and Managing Domestic Space at the Fringes of Civilization
3 The Most Public of Private Women: Prostitutes, Reformers, and Police Courts
4 The Farmer, the Pioneer Woman, and the Hired Hand: Sexual Violence, Seduction, and the Boundaries of Class
5 For Family, Nation, and Empire: Policing Drugs, Abortion, and Heterosexuality in the Interwar City
6 The Might of a Good Strong Hand: Domestic Violence, Wife Murder, and Incest
7 She Is to Be Pitied, Not Punished: The Murderess, the Woman Question, and the Capital Punishment Debate
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index