Militarism, Hunting, Imperialism : 'Blooding' The Martial Male Hardback

The late Victorian and Edwardian officer class viewed hunting and big game hunting in particular, as a sound preparation for imperial warfare.

For the imperial officer in the making, the ‘blooding’ hunting ritual was a visible ‘hallmark’ of stirling martial masculinity.

Sir Henry Newbolt, the period poet of subaltern self-sacrifice, typically considered hunting as essential for the creation of a ‘masculine sporting spirit’ necessary for the consolidation and extension of the empire.

Hunting was seen as a manifestation of Darwinian masculinity that maintained a pre-ordained hierarchical order of superordinate and subordinate breeds. Militarism, Hunting, Imperialism examines these ideas under the following five sections:martial imperialism: the self-sacrificial subaltern‘blooding’ the middle class martial malethe imperial officer, hunting and warmartial masculinity proclaimed and consolidatedmartial masculinity adapted and adjusted. This book was published as a special issue of the International Journal of the History of Sport.