Settler society is a theoretical term in early modern and modern history that describes a common link between modern, predominantly

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

an, attempts to permanently settle in other areas of the world. It is used to distinguish settler colonies from resource extraction colonies. The term came to wide use in the 1970s as part of the discourse on

decolonization Decolonization or decolonisation is the undoing of colonialism, the latter being the process whereby imperial nations establish and dominate foreign territories, often overseas. Some scholars of decolonization focus especially on separatism, in ...

, particularly to describe older colonial units.

Examples

One of the earliest examples of settler society was the

Kingdom of Jerusalem The Kingdom of Jerusalem ( la, Regnum Hierosolymitanum; fro, Roiaume de Jherusalem), officially known as the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem or the Frankish Kingdom of Palestine,Example (title of works): was a Crusader state that was establishe ...

, which was established by

Crusaders The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and sometimes directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The best known of these Crusades are those to the Holy Land in the period between 1095 and 1291 that were in ...

and lasted for almost 200 years. It constituted a localized

feudal Feudalism, also known as the feudal system, was the combination of the legal, economic, military, cultural and political customs that flourished in Middle Ages, medieval Europe between the 9th and 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a wa ...

hierarchy established by the

Franks The Franks ( la, Franci or ) were a group of Germanic peoples whose name was first mentioned in 3rd-century Roman sources, and associated with tribes between the Lower Rhine and the Ems River, on the edge of the Roman Empire.H. Schutz: Tools, ...

, who ruled and exploited the territory according to their political and economic interests. The

European colonization of the Americas During the Age of Discovery, a large scale European colonization of the Americas took place between about 1492 and 1800. Although the Norse had explored and colonized areas of the North Atlantic, colonizing Greenland and creating a short ter ...

resulted in the establishment of several settler societies, while

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

was also established as a series of settler societies by European settlers during the

colonization of Australia Colonization, or colonisation, constitutes large-scale population movements wherein migrants maintain strong links with their, or their ancestors', former country – by such links, gain advantage over other inhabitants of the territory. When ...

during the 19th century.

Province of men

As a traditional model of comparative analysis, it has been described as the means by which white male settlers "heroically" conquer a land and established

democracies Democracy (From grc, δημοκρατία, dēmokratía, ''dēmos'' 'people' and ''kratos'' 'rule') is a form of government in which the people have the authority to deliberate and decide legislation (" direct democracy"), or to choose gov ...

of one sort or another. This particular conceptualization has been criticized for ignoring issues such as race, ethnicity, and gender. However, it is noted that while the concept of settler society is structured along traditional gender lines, female settlers enjoyed favorable competitive position in comparison to their counterparts in the

metropole A metropole (from the Greek ''metropolis'' for "mother city") is the homeland, central territory or the state exercising power over a colonial empire. From the 19th century, the English term ''metropole'' was mainly used in the scope of ...

. For instance, a colonial administrator's wife or a female teacher was able to attain wider social recognition in settler societies.

References

Bibliography

*Sherene H. Razack ''Race, space, and the law: Unmapping a white settler society'' Toronto, Ontario: Between the Lines, 2002 *D Pearson, "Theorizing citizenship in British settler societies" ''Ethnic and Racial Studies,'' 2002. Settler colonialism Settlers {{hist-stub