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Life, Earth, Colony

Life, Earth, Colony explores the ideas, life, and historical significance of German zoologist turned geographer Friedrich Ratzel (1844–1904), famous for developing the foundations of geopolitical thought. Ratzel produced a remarkable body of work that revolutionized the study of space, movement, col...

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Main Author: Klinke, Ian
Format: Online
Language:English
Published: University of Michigan Press 2025
Subjects:
Friedrich Ratzel, necropolitics, death, human geography, anthropogeography, geopoolitics, war, biopolitics, German colonialism, fascism, national socialism, the far right, scientific racism, Darwinism, vitalism, monism, German empire, geographical thought, history of ideas, history of science
thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History
thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHD European history
thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JP Politics and government::JPA Political science and theory
thema EDItEUR::R Earth Sciences, Geography, Environment, Planning::RG Geography::RGC Human geography
Online Access:ONIX_20250131_9780472903511_6
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Summary:Life, Earth, Colony explores the ideas, life, and historical significance of German zoologist turned geographer Friedrich Ratzel (1844–1904), famous for developing the foundations of geopolitical thought. Ratzel produced a remarkable body of work that revolutionized the study of space, movement, colonization, and war. He also served as a source of intellectual inspiration for national socialism, particularly through his Lebensraum (living space) concept, which understood all life as being caught in an eternal struggle for space. This book closely analyzes this radical conservative intellectual, focusing on his often-overlooked ethnography, biogeography, travel, and creative writing, and colonial activism as well as his more widely-known political geography. Life, Earth, Colony finds that there is an as yet unexplored necropolitical impulse at the heart of Ratzel’s entire oeuvre, a preoccupation with death and dying, which had a profound impact on twentieth-century history.

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