Tony Ballantyne (historian)

[1][2] Tony Ballantyne (born Dunedin, 1972) is a New Zealand historian at the University of Otago, Dunedin. After completing his schooling at King's High School, Dunedin, he graduated BA at the University of Otago and obtained a PhD at the University of Cambridge under the supervision of Professor Christopher Bayly.[3] He returned to the University of Otago's Dunedin campus to build his career, though did teach briefly abroad at Washington University in St. Louis, the University of Illinois, and the National University of Ireland.[4] He is currently Pro-Vice-Chancellor of Humanities at Otago, a position he assumed in 2015.

Although he has promoted the value of history and the humanities in New Zealand, his career has also been marred in this regard.[5] Shortly after assuming the role of Pro-Vice-Chancellor of Humanities he initiated a process that resulted in 16 full-time equivalent academic staff being made redundant, with other academics impelled to take early retirement.[6][7][8][9][10][11] He also advocated eliminating the Art History program and it was subsequently disestablished.[12][13]

In October 2020 the University of Otago announced that Ballantyne would not be continuing as Pro-Vice-Chancellor of Humanities but, instead, will lead the Division of External Engagement effective January 2021.[14] In this capacity he will oversee the university's alumni relations, its liaising with secondary schools and recruitment of students, and the development and advertising of the university's "brand."[15]

Scholarship

Ballantyne has established a significant reputation in New Zealand academic circles, including being elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand in 2012.[16] In 2016 he was awarded the Humanities Aronui Medal from the Royal Society of New Zealand for innovation in humanities research.[17]

Ballantyne’s work examines the development of imperial intellectual and cultural life in New Zealand, Ireland, India, and Britain. It is situated in the tradition of scholarship that sees colonialism as a cultural undertaking as well as a political and economic project.[18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25]

He has analysed the British empire as a 'web,' with 'vertical' connections developing between Britain and its colonies and 'horizontal' connections linking various colonies directly. He has helped shed light on how these 'webs of empire' incorporated new lands and peoples.[26] More specifically, Orientalism and Race (2001) analysed the 'orientalizing' texts of British officials in colonial India and their attempts to decode both Hinduism and Sikhism more broadly in terms of their understandings of Aryanism and race; at the same time it examined similar discourses directed toward understandings of Maori as, first, "Semitic", then Indo-Aryan, and ultimately, Maori reconfigurations of Christianity on their own terms.

With regard to Sikh studies, Ballantyne has been among the critics of scholarship that focus on Sikh texts, arguing that the experiences of colonialism and migration have been crucial in making Sikh identities.[27][28][29][30][31]

In recent years Ballantyne, who directs Otago's Centre for Research on Colonial Culture, has returned to focus on New Zealand's colonial history. This work has sought to internationalise New Zealand historical writing by noting the historical connections to China and India in shaping colonial culture. Along the lines of Benedict Anderson's formulation of "print capitalism," Ballantyne has emphasised the place of print culture and literacy in the encounters between Māori and the Pākehā colonists.[32][33] addressing the changing structure of the empire, and the place of race and religion in cross-cultural history. His most recent book, Entanglements of Empire (2014), focuses on early New Zealand history and the foundations of relationship between Māori and Pākehā.[34][35] It was awarded the W.H. Oliver prize for the best book on New Zealand history between 2013 and 2015 by the New Zealand Historical Association.[36]

With Antoinette Burton he has also written about world history, highlighting the importance of race and gender in cross-cultural encounters.[37][38]

Works
  • Entanglements of Empire: Missionaries, Māori, and the Question of the Body (Duke University Press, 2014).
  • Webs of Empire: Locating New Zealand's Colonial Past (Bridget Williams Books, 2012).
  • Between Colonialism and Diaspora: Sikh Cultural Formations in an Imperial World (Duke University Press, 2006).
  • Orientalism and Race: Aryanism in the British Empire (Cambridge Imperial and Post-Colonial Studies Series, Palgrave, 2001).
  • Co-editor, Moving Subjects: Gender, Mobility and Intimacy in an Age of Global Empire (University of Illinois Press, 2007).
  • Editor, Textures of the Sikh Past: New Historical Interpretations (Oxford University Press, 2007).
  • Co-editor, Disputed Histories: Reimagining New Zealand's Pasts (Otago University Press, 2006).
  • Co-editor, Bodies in Contact: Rethinking Colonial Encounters in World History (Duke University Press, 2005).

References
  1. "Toxic management by Otago administrators". 9 March 2020.
  2. "Protests against cuts by PVC Ballantyne".
  3. Archived 6 December 2010 at the Wayback Machine
  4. "31 July 2015, Otago selects leading historian as its next Head of Humanities, News at Otago, University of Otago, New Zealand". otago.ac.nz. Retrieved 9 November 2015.
  5. "Humanities 'crisis' hits enrolments | Otago Daily Times Online News : Otago, South Island, New Zealand & International News". Otago Daily Times. Retrieved 9 November 2015.
  6. Taylor, Margot (27 July 2016). "Humanities cuts closer at University". Retrieved 16 July 2020.
  7. Taylor, Margot (25 August 2016). "400 protest humanities cuts". Retrieved 16 July 2020.
  8. Prof Kevin Clements & Rev Dr Peter Matheson (18 November 2019). "Toxic atmosphere at Otago Uni risks becoming 'chronic'". Retrieved 16 July 2020.
  9. Munro, Bruce (9 March 2020). "A culture of control". Retrieved 16 July 2020.
  10. Elder, Vaughn (22 February 2017). "Vice-chancellor accused of intimidation". Retrieved 19 July 2020.
  11. "The university's blues". 11 March 2020. Retrieved 2 August 2020.
  12. [McPhee, Elena (26 September 2018). "Otago Uni votes to scrap art history". Otago Daily Times. Retrieved 24 April 2019. "Elimination of Art History"] Check |url= value (help).
  13. "Art history's proposed demise 'sad but predictable'. McPhee, Elena (27 August 2018) Otago Daily Times. Retrieved 11 July 2020". 27 August 2018.
  14. MacLean, Hamish (14 October 2020). "Ballantyne chosen for leading uni role". Otago Daily Times. Retrieved 18 October 2020.
  15. "University of Otago External Engagement Division". The University of Otago. Retrieved 18 October 2020.
  16. "Five Otago academic selected RSNZ fellows | Otago Daily Times Online News : Otago, South Island, New Zealand & International News". Otago Daily Times. 18 October 2012. Retrieved 6 October 2013.
  17. http://www.otago.ac.nz/humanities/news/otago627646.html
  18. Multiple Authors (1982–2005). SUBALTERN STUDIES Volumes 1-12. Oxford University Press.
  19. Said, Edward W. (1969). "Swift's Tory Anarchy". Eighteenth-Century Studies. 3 (1): 48–66. doi:10.2307/2737698. ISSN 0013-2586. JSTOR 2737698.
  20. Said, Edward (1978). "Orientalism". Pantheon Books.
  21. Cohn, Bernard (1961). "From Indian Status to British Contract". The Journal of Economic History. 21 (4): 613–628. doi:10.1017/S002205070010909X.
  22. Cohn, Bernard (1996). Colonialism and its forms of knowledge : the British in India. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-19-565970-8.
  23. Inden, Ronald B. (1990). Imagining India. Oxford.
  24. Inden, Ronald (1986). "Orientalist Constructions of India". Modern Asian Studies. Cambridge U Press.
  25. Hobsbawm, E. J. & Ranger, T. O. (1983). The Invention of tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-24645-8. OCLC 8763782.CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  26. "Orientalism and Race | Palgrave Macmillan". Palgrave.com. Retrieved 6 October 2013.
  27. Fox, Richard G. (1985). Lions of the Punjab: Culture in the Making. University of California Press.
  28. Axel, Brian (2001). The nation's tortured body : violence, representation and the formation of a Sikh diaspora. Duke University Press. ISBN 0-8223-2607-8. OCLC 469429107.
  29. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 3 September 2007. Retrieved 10 November 2018.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  30. "historycooperative.org". historycooperative.org. Archived from the original on 21 August 2008. Retrieved 6 October 2013.
  31. "Textures of the Sikh Past – Hardcover – Tony Ballantyne – Oxford University Press". Oup.com. 15 July 2008. Retrieved 6 October 2013.
  32. Anderson, Benedict (1983). Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Verso.
  34. Reid, Nicholas (20 April 2015). "Reid's Reader – A Blog of Book Reviews and Comment.: Something New". Reid's Reader – A Blog of Book Reviews and Comment. Retrieved 9 November 2015.
  35. "The tangled history of Maori and missionaries". Stuff. Retrieved 9 November 2015.
  36. nzha.org.nz/2015/12/07/re-w-h-oliver-prize-announcement/
  37. Burton, Antoinette; Ballantyne, Tony (31 January 2005). Bodies in Contact: Rethinking Colonial Encounters in World History – Google Books. ISBN 0822386453. Retrieved 6 October 2013.
  38. Ballantyne, Tony; Burton, Antoinette M. (2009). Moving Subjects: Gender, Mobility, and Intimacy in an Age of Global Empire – Google Books. ISBN 9780252075681. Retrieved 6 October 2013.
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