The mirror of the black body

Colonial desires and civilizing missions

Abstract

Richard Burton’s The Lake Regions of Central Africa (1860), Volume I has been studied as an example of British Imperial values regarding the settling in Africa in the late nineteenth century. Broadly speaking, most works have focused on how the text expresses these ideas and very little work has been carried out on researching the meanings of the imagery used in the text. In this short piece, I look at how the original frontispiece of The Lake Regions of Central Africa (1860), Volume I is revealing of colonial desires and civilizing missions. Particularly, I argue that the image reveals a projection of white through the expression of sexual desires towards the black body, settling fantasies and civilizing mission goals.