A Due Observance of Justice? Protectors of Aborigines in Britain’s Australasian Colonies, 1837-1857

该项目将是对维多利亚、南澳大利亚州、西澳大利亚州和新西兰殖民地早期土著人保护者的首次比较研究。这些保护者被英国帝国政府任命，以保护土著人民免受残忍、压迫和不公正的伤害，他们的职位含糊不清，努力调和殖民野心和人道主义情绪之间相互冲突的目标。他们坐在帝国、定居者和土著利益的结合点上，就慈善热情和定居者扩张的汇合点进行谈判。保护者的生命提供了一个独特的视角，让我们了解殖民努力的人类代价、其道德困境及其持久遗产。

This project will be the first comparative study of the Protectors of Aborigines in early colonial Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia and New Zealand. Appointed by Britain's imperial government to shield Indigenous peoples 'from cruelty, oppression and injustice', the protectors held an ambiguous office, struggling to reconcile the conflicting aims of colonial ambition and humanitarian sentiment. They sat at the nexus of imperial, settler and Indigenous interests, negotiating a convergence of philanthropic enthusiasm and settler expansion. The lives of the protectors offer a unique insight into the human cost of colonial endeavour, its moral dilemmas and its lasting legacies.