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Dissertation Information for Ruth H. L. Dickens

NAME:
- Ruth H. L. Dickens

DEGREE:
- Ph.D.

DISCIPLINE:
- History

SCHOOL:
- Emory University (USA) (2001)

ADVISORS:
- Kathryn E Amdur

COMMITTEE MEMBERS:
- Randall M Packard
- Margot C Finn

MPACT Status: Fully Complete

Title: Defining French citizenship policy in West Africa, 1895--1956

Abstract: My dissertation is a cultural, political, and legal inquiry into the process by which Africans from the French colonies in West Africa became citizens of France. Between the mid-1890s--almost two decades before the first decree to establish guidelines for French naturalization was promulgated in West Africa--and the introduction of universal suffrage in 1956, hundreds of Africans applied for French citizenship. Some of these applicants resided in France, but most had no intention of leaving the colonies; they typically sought citizenship to gain access to French courts or positions in the colonial administration, likely also to avoid forced labor requirements and arbitrary prison terms. Their requests, therefore, were of concern to both metropolitan and colonial authorities, a matter of governmental policy both at home and overseas. French officials denied citizenship to the majority of applicants, citing various reasons for both granting and refusing requests in their correspondence with other government authorities. This correspondence, along with naturalization files, parliamentary debates, citizenship legislation, newspapers, and records of court cases, all highlight the interest that authorities and scholars in both France and West Africa had in the issue of citizenship for French subjects.

The application process was complicated and lengthy, and citizenship regulations were revised many times throughout the colonial period. Even if candidates met the requirements enumerated in the citizenship decrees, their dossiers were individually assessed according to criteria which were not present in the actual texts of the measures. Both metropolitan concerns and local conditions played a role in the evaluation of applications. Assumptions about what constituted Frenchness were continually reshaped by both French and Africans, as decisions on whether or not to award citizenship--and the naturalization laws themselves--were contested and negotiated. This dissertation, by examining debates over citizenship for Africans during the colonial period, contributes to a further understanding of French colonial policy and sheds new light on what it meant to be French in the first half of the twentieth century.

MPACT Scores for Ruth H. L. Dickens

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calculated 2008-02-02 22:49:08

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Students under Ruth H. L. Dickens

ADVISEES:
- None

COMMITTEESHIPS:
- None