The Binghams’ Empire: Systematically Healing Starboard
By José
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The Binghams’ aspiration to rise in status reinforces the ideologies of empire’s hierarchical institutions. Similar to the Binghams’ quest for caste betterment, in A Transitional Moment author Mrinalini Sinha describes, “the impact of ‘Sanskritization,’ the process by which intermediate and low-caste groups adopted upper-caste practices to strengthen their claims for upward mobility, frequently entailed fresh restriction on women as marker of the higher social status claimed by the group.”(1) Sinha focuses on how women deal with the plight of the “low-caste” by mimicking those women of a higher status, but in doing so found restrictions on many of their behaviors as they had to act accordingly. These ideologies of adequate behavior are dictated by empires and their institutions who judge individuals. If the Binghams’ would not have aspired acceptance from the institutions and “upward mobility,” Thomas Bingham would have stayed in the cutlery business like his stepfather William Backus (3), but instead the Binghams’ “adopted upper-caste practices” in the religious hierarchy. But now religious restrictions would direct the course of the Binghams’ posterity by requiring them to spread the Bible.
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The demand for caste advancement in empire led the Binghams to religious and academic institutions in their search for betterment, while simultaneously helping reinforce and disperse empire worldwide. In the article, The Papers of Three Hiram Binghams, Randall C. Jimerson describes some of Hiram Bingham I, II, and III’s achievements. Hiram Bingham I was born in 1789 and like his father, Thomas Bingham Jr, he graduated from Middlebury College, went to Andover Theological Seminary and joined the missionary service (3). He was commissioned to travel to Hawaii where he designed a church with his family, and once there “developed a written form for the Hawaiian language” to help translate the Bible and convert the natives of Hawaii. Afterward, Hiram Bingham wrote a book titled, A Residence of Twenty-one Years in the Sandwich Islands. Jimerson then mentions Hiram Bingham II, born in 1831, and his personal accomplishments that are similar to his father’s. Bingham II graduated from Yale, and also went to Andover Seminary. Like his father, he was a missionary but Bingham II went to the Gilbert Islands. He helped develop a written language and to translate the Bible into Gilbertese (4). He also published a book about his missionary experience titled, Story of the Morning Star. Acquisition of credentials from academic institutions was another way to mimic others in an empire which had earned success from the commerce of publishing books of scholarly interest.
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Family succession from religious institutions into academic institutions are an addition to the career building of Bingham I and II from those of their predecessors, signifying an evolution of empire through the creation of academic establishments and a new hierarchical system of restrictions. In Colonialism and its Forms of Knowledge author Bernard Cohn explains that since 18th century “European states increasingly made their power visible not only through ritual performance and dramatic display, but through gradual extension of ‘officializing’ procedures that established and extended their capacity in many areas,” (5) illustrating the importance of official documentation and credentials in empire. Just as religion used the Bible “rituals” like marriage, many academic establishments would use their accreditations to validate careers by “officializing” people as experts in a profession. Cohn goes on to say that “schools became the crucial civilizing institutions and sought to produce moral and productive citizens” of an empire (6). The importance of academic institutions lies in the production of individuals and families like the Binghams’, civilized and with a need to be “productive.” Top academies like Harvard or Yale would demand high performance from students as well as wealthy finances to pay tuition in order to be accepted. This created new restrictions for many people unable to attend these establishments and making the process of accreditation available only to a select few. Cohn writes, “the power to define the nature of the past and establish priorities in the creation of a monumental record of a civilization, and to propound canons of taste, are among the most significant instrumentalities of rulership,” (7) describing how empire can use academic institutions as instruments of dominion and oppression. Academic establishments hold the “power” when “defining” or deciding how to remember history. The Binghams’ narratives would appeal to a certain “canons of taste” that resemble European empires. Having degrees from academic institutions of the “rulership” ogive the Binghams’ authority to “define” and prioritize which “monumental” events need to be recorded as “significant” in colonization, and could have simultaneously alter the direction of empire’s growth by the manipulation of the content in their books. The religious title of missionaries and the academic degrees to be recognized in literary terms helped the Binghams’ betterment, while concurrently widening empire’s oppressive ideology through the agency in the books they read and wrote.
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Notes:
1. Sinha, Mrinalini. Specters of Mother India: The Global Restructuring of an Empire. Durham: Duke University Press, 2006. Internet resource. Page 57
2. Taylor, Norris. William Backus - Early Norwich, Conn Settler, ntgen.tripod.com/bw/bkus_index.html.
3. Jimerson, Randall C. "The Papers of Three Hiram Binghams." The Yale University Library Gazette. 54.2 (1979): 85-90. Print. Page 86
4. Jimerson, Page 87
5. Cohn, Bernard S. Colonialism and Its Forms of Knowledge: The British in India. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press, 1996. Internet resource. Page 3
6. Cohn, Page 3
7. Cohn, Page 10