Norman Etherington was born 27 June 1941 at Port Townsend, Washington. He was educated at Mount Vernon High School, Mount Vernon Washington and Yale University, BA 1963, MA 1966, PhD 1971.[1]
His published books, journal articles and conference papers mostly concern European imperialism in theory and practice, Christian missions, and British rule in Africa, Oceania, and the Caribbean. He has also served on the editorial boards of several academic journals. He held visiting appointments at the
Institute of Commonwealth Studies (1974,1989), the
University of Cape Town (1981,1993),
Columbia University (1984), Humanities Research Center,
Australian National University (1995), Institut des Civilisations Comparées,
Université de Provence, Aix-en-Provence (1995–96) and
Rhodes University (2002). He was a non-resident Research Associate at the
University of South Africa from 2001 to 2021.[4]
Books
1978. Preachers, Peasants and Politics in Southeast Africa 1835-1880. London: Royal Historical Society.[5][6]
1984. Theories of Imperialism: War, Conquest and Capital. London: Croom Helm.[8]
1984. Time Gentlemen, Please!!: The Story of the Fight to Save the Aurora Hotel, 1983 Adelaide: Kitchener Press.
1991. The Annotated She (edited, extensively annotated and introduced). Bloomington: Indiana University Press.[9][10]
1992. Peace, Politics and Violence in the New South Africa (edited and introduced). Oxford: Hans Zell.[11][12][13]
2001. The Great Treks: The Transformation of Southern Africa, 1815-1854. London: Longman.[14][15]
2005. Missions and Empire (edited, introduced, and contributed one chapter). Oxford: Oxford University Press.[16][17][18]
2007. Mapping Colonial Conquest: Australia and Southern Africa (edited, introduced and contributed 3 chapters). Perth: UWA Press.[19]
2010. Grappling with the Beast: Indigenous Southern African Responses to Colonialism:1840-1930 (edited with Peter Limb and Peter Midgeley; contributed one chapter).[20]
2015. Indigenous Evangelists and Questions of Authority in the British Empire, 1750-1940, co-authored with Peggy Brock, Gareth Griffiths and Jacqueline Van Gent. Leiden: Brill.[21]
2016. Big Game Hunter: A Biography of Frederick Courteney Selous. Ramsbury, Wiltshire: Robert Hale.[22]
2017. The 2016 South Australian Community Consultation on Local Heritage. Adelaide: National Trust of South Australia.
2017. Imperium of the Soul: The Political and Aesthetic Imagination of Edwardian Imperialists. Manchester: Manchester University Press.[23][24]
2021. A 50 Year Plan for Metropolitan Adelaide. Adelaide: National Trust of South Australia.