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Mary Carpenter: The Transportation of Victorian Ideology and Juvenile Reform to Colonial India During the Nineteenth Century, Comparison and Contradictions

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Bibliographic Details
Title: Mary Carpenter: The Transportation of Victorian Ideology and Juvenile Reform to Colonial India During the Nineteenth Century, Comparison and Contradictions
Authors: Tahaney Alghrani
Source: Imperial Crime and Punishment ISBN: 9781837972302
Publisher Information: Emerald Publishing Limited, 2025.
Publication Year: 2025
Description: Mary Carpenter’s reputation as a pioneering Juvenile penal reformer rests primarily on her domestic achievements, particularly the establishment of Red Lodge female reformatory in Bristol. However, her significant contributions to penal reform in colonial India remain substantially underexamined. Between 1865 and 1876, Carpenter undertook four visits to India, culminating in her influential work Six Months in India (1868) which articulated her vision of India’s potential elevation among nations through the British Colonial administration. Female reformers like Carpenter occupied ambiguous positions within colonial administration. Their gender provided both limitation and opportunities within Victorian society, while their racial identity granted them authority over colonised populations. This positioning enabled them to advocate for reform while maintaining fundamental assumptions about British cultural and moral superiority. This chapter examines how Victorian reformers like Carpenter appropriated domestic ideologies and solutions for juvenile penal reform within the colonial context. Through comparative analysis of juvenile reform initiatives in England and India during the nineteenth century, it explores a critical yet neglected dimension of the relationship between imperialism and historical criminology, investigating the complex intersections of gender, class and racial identity within colonial penal discourse.
Document Type: Part of book or chapter of book
Language: English
DOI: 10.1108/978-1-83797-230-220251003
Accession Number: edsair.doi...........171bdeaefeb41ab4dcb453bc46d6c788
Database: OpenAIRE
Description
Abstract:Mary Carpenter’s reputation as a pioneering Juvenile penal reformer rests primarily on her domestic achievements, particularly the establishment of Red Lodge female reformatory in Bristol. However, her significant contributions to penal reform in colonial India remain substantially underexamined. Between 1865 and 1876, Carpenter undertook four visits to India, culminating in her influential work Six Months in India (1868) which articulated her vision of India’s potential elevation among nations through the British Colonial administration. Female reformers like Carpenter occupied ambiguous positions within colonial administration. Their gender provided both limitation and opportunities within Victorian society, while their racial identity granted them authority over colonised populations. This positioning enabled them to advocate for reform while maintaining fundamental assumptions about British cultural and moral superiority. This chapter examines how Victorian reformers like Carpenter appropriated domestic ideologies and solutions for juvenile penal reform within the colonial context. Through comparative analysis of juvenile reform initiatives in England and India during the nineteenth century, it explores a critical yet neglected dimension of the relationship between imperialism and historical criminology, investigating the complex intersections of gender, class and racial identity within colonial penal discourse.
DOI:10.1108/978-1-83797-230-220251003