Caroline Elkins

Caroline Elkins (born 1969) is an associate professor of History at Harvard University. She studies the colonial encounter in Africa during the twentieth century. In 2006, she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction for her book on British treatment of the Kikuyu in Kenya, "".She is currently Policy Fellow at the Kennedy School of Government in the Carr Centre for Human Rights Policy, Harvard University, U.S..

Biography

Caroline Elkins graduated, "summa cum laude", with a major in History from Princeton University. She received her Master's and Doctoral degrees in History from Harvard. She teaches courses on modern Africa, protest in East Africa, human rights in Africa, and British colonial violence in the 20th century.

Criticism of Elkins' work

Elkins' work was criticized by historian Lawrence James in "The Sunday Times" as being a one-sided account of the Mau Mau Uprising. In an article in The Guardian, James, in turn, was criticized for "whitewashing the history of the British empire".ref|murray-2006

Nicholas Best, acknowledging that "there can be no excuse for what happened" in Kenya, questioned Elkins' detention and casualty figures as "ludicrous" and accused Elkins of being selective in her sources.ref|best-2005

Richard Dowden wrote a critical review of Elkins' book in "The Guardian".ref|dowden-2005 James Mitchell, in a highly critical review of the book, said 'I shudder for those of her students who expect academic rigour: Elkins doesn't let facts stand in the way of a good rant.'ref|mitchell-2005

David Elstein has also noted severe shortcomings in Elkins' methodology and conclusions. Elstein contends that her casualty figures are derived from an idiosyncratic reading of census figures and a tendentious interpretation of the fortified village scheme.

The BBC documentary "Kenya: White Terror" was based on Elkins'controversial research into the Mau Mau. It aired on Sunday 17 November 2002 on BBC Two at 1915 GMT and subsequently on BBC World. As a result of complaints made against this documentary, Ofcom (the British broadcasting watchdog) ruled that the programme had been partially unfair to Terrence Gavaghan, whom Elkins accuses of brutality.

Elkins' Harvard colleague Niall Ferguson, who praised Elkins for her research which he described as "painstaking", nevertheless described her book as a "sensationalist" account of the rebellion.ref|ferguson-2006

In 2007, the demographer John Blacker writing in "African Affairs" demonstrated in detail that Elkins' estimates of casualties were grossly over estimated.ref|blacker-2007

Works

*"" (Henry Holt/Jonathan Cape, 2005)
*"Settler Colonialists in the 20th Century: Projects, Practices, Legacies" (Routledge, edited with Susan Pedersen, 2005)

External links

* [http://www.courses.fas.harvard.edu/~history/facultyPage.cgi?id=39 Caroline Elkins' faculty web page at Harvard]
* [http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4825098311863655988&hl=en Caroline Elkins - Colonial War Crimes in Kenya: Prospects for Reconciliation (2005, video program)]
* [http://www.nybooks.com/articles/18096 David Elstein on Elkins' methodological shortcomings]
* [http://www.lrb.co.uk/v27/n11/letters.html#2 David Elstein on Elkins' errors]
* [http://www.ofcom.org.uk/tv/obb/prog_cb/pcb67/Adjudications/gavaghan.pdf Ofcom report on complaints against the documentary "Kenya: White Terror"]
* Mau Mau Uprising
* Fitz R S de Souza

References

* cite news | last=Murray | first=Andrew | title="In the realm of the senseless" | publisher=The Guardian, date=2006-06-19
* cite news | last=Best | first=Nicholas | title=" They died cursing the British" | publisher=The Daily Telegraph | date=2005-01-16 | accessdate=2007-02-06 | url=http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml;sessionid=5UGJYNIIAYPCPQFIQMGCM5OAVCBQUJVC?xml=/arts/2005/01/16/boand16.xml&sSheet=/arts/2005/01/16/bomain.html
* cite news | last=Dowden | first=Richard | title="State of shame" | publisher=The Guardian | date=2005-02-05 | accessdate=2007-02-06 | url=http://books.guardian.co.uk/reviews/history/0,6121,1406225,00.html
* cite news | last=Mitchell | first=James | title="Beyond mischievous fictions, there's blood and barbarity" | publisher=The Star | date=2005-04-14 | accessdate=2007-02-06 | url=http://www.thestar.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=129&fArticleId=2481525
* cite news | last=Ferguson| first=Niall| title=" Niall Ferguson: Home truths about famine, war and genocide" | publisher=The Independent | date=2006-06-14 | accessdate=2007-06-08 | url=http://comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/article994043.ece
* John Blacker, 'The demography of Mau Mau: fertility and mortality in Kenya in the 1950s: a demographer's viewpoint.' "African Affairs" 106, Number 423: 205-227 (2007).

Persondata
NAME=Elkins, Caroline
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SHORT DESCRIPTION=Pulitzer prize winner and professor of History who studies colonial encounter in Africa during the twentieth century.
DATE OF BIRTH=1969
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DATE OF DEATH=
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