Contesting Cosmopolitan Moments in the Long Eighteenth Century

Examines literary manifestations of eighteenth-century cosmopolitanism to reveal cosmopolitanism’s relevance for postcoloniality.

Contesting Cosmopolitan Moments in the Long Eighteenth Century traces expansions of Classical cosmopolitanism in long-eighteenth-century Britain to shows how acts of inclusion from cosmopolitan viewpoints sought to cope with British imperialism, war, social injustice, slavery, and technologies of self- and societal improvement, concerns that survive to this day. The Classical inheritance uncovered here yields more precise contouring of cosmopolitanism and of the eighteenth-century innovations that prefigure postcolonial debates. Additionally, considerations of style fill a lacuna in eighteenth-century literary studies, where cosmopolitanism remains a rather under-explored hermeneutical tool. Inviting readers to appreciate cosmopolitanism as a developing rather than as a static and completed philosophy, this study refutes an objection that circulated in the eighteenth century and is still present today, namely, cosmopolitanism’s disdain for local values.