Colonial Education Goes International: A Micro-History of Knowledge Production and Circulation in an Age of Imperial Crisis


 By focusing on the individual trajectory of Albert Charton (1893–1980), a French educationalist and civil servant who was active in West Africa and Indochina during the 1930s and 1940s, this article offers an original approach to the analysis of knowledge production and circulation in relation to the colonial world. More specifically, the study of Charton's involvement in several imperial, international, and interimperial bodies allows for a new understanding of the evolution of discussions concerning the content and aims of colonial education, including its growing importance within development paradigms. Such a micro-historical perspective also reveals the mechanisms and sometimes contrasting (political) rationales of the process of internationalisation of educational knowledge, thus providing new insights into the interconnections between imperialism and internationalism.