The British census of India fed Anglo-American fears of Muslim demographic dominance

Evidence

The “scientific” dimension of European imperialism not only seemed to affirm existing views about Muslims and Islam it also helped deepen fears by proving how many Muslims existed. Anglo-American literature about Muslims repeatedly stressed their considerable population. Recall that in Smith’s essay on Turkey, he warned Americans of “hordes of yet unnamed barbarian invaders” that might sweep the US if enough missionaries did not meet the Islamic threat. In 1842 Hayward indicated a world population of 140 million Muslims. An 1850 letter in the Missionary Herald by a “Mr. Hume” began with a reckoning of the relative numbers of Muslims and Hindus in Bombay, drawing on data derived from the recently instituted census there. 55 Although some European states had begun to develop demographic tools to better understand their populations by this time, the British were creating a more thorough and expansive census for its Indian territories than they exercised at home. The first all-India census (1872) and the several city and provincial counts that preceded it each required those polled to give their religion. The resulting numbers alarmed Britons because the population of Muslims exceeded their expectations. But, more than statistics on the overall Muslim population, those tracking its growth only 51 Haywood, p. — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 90

Categorization

• XREF: Directly serves the reader’s MOC thread goal: here is an institutional relay (colonial census) manufacturing the ‘Muslim masses as threat’ numeric template. — connects to: British census data on Muslim numbers amplified Anglo-American fears. — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear:…, 90; British India feared pan-Islamism later than America did — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 137; Although Britons in India differed from Americans because of the active (if exaggerated) threat to their political order, both shared a conviction regarding two alleged qualities of Islam that made it a perennial menace: the proclivity of Muslims to spread their religion and to do so violently. In their reflections on the proselytizing power of Muslims – an issue among Europeans since at least the eighth century when predominantly Christian north Africa and Spain converted almost entirely to Islam – Americans and Britons almost universally explained mass conversion as the result of coercion. (+1 more)
• QUESTION: The census required respondents to state their religion — did these categories themselves construct the Muslim bloc as a countable, hence threatenable, entity?

Related

• British census data on Muslim numbers amplified Anglo-American fears. (similarity 0.93)
• Britain’s Indian census counted religion more thoroughly than its own census. (similarity 0.88)
• Arab activists fear census data could enable state surveillance (similarity 0.84)
• British India feared pan-Islamism later than America did (similarity 0.84)
• Colonial demography fueled fears that Islam would eclipse Hinduism in Bengal. (similarity 0.84)
• A worldwide Muslim threat narrative came to frame British perceptions (similarity 0.79)
• Britons in India, unlike Americans, faced an active (if exaggerated) Muslim threat to their political order, yet both shared convictions regarding Islam’s coercive proselytizing and violent spread. (similarity 0.78)
• Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg — Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear Islamophobia in the United States and British India, 1687–1947 (similarity 0.78)
• Anglo-American observers explained Muslim expansion as caused by inherent religious fanaticism. (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• British census data on Muslim numbers amplified Anglo-American fears. #corroborates (0.95) — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 90
• Although Britons in India differed from Americans because of the active (if exaggerated) threat to their political order, both shared a conviction regarding two alleged qualities of Islam that… #expands (0.80)
• A worldwide Muslim threat narrative came to frame British perceptions #expands (0.75)
• British India feared pan-Islamism later than America did #qualifies (0.70) — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 137