Ben Maddison teaches Australian history and historical and social theory at the University of Wollongong, where his research interests include polar and exploration history. His research interests developed in the context of his employment as a historian on Antarctic eco-advernture tourist ships. Class and Colonialism in Antarctic Exploration is his first single-authored monograph.

'will hold considerable interest to students of exploration and maritime history in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Maddison makes an important contribution by reading Antarctic history through the lens of labour relations and by locating that history within the wider network of imperial political and economic power relations.' Journal of Historical Geography 'well written and fascinating ... a valuable contribution not only to the history of Antarctic expeditions but also to the history of European expansion overseas.' Imperial & Global Forum 'for libraries interested in Marxist dialectical analysis.' CHOICE

• Introduction; Part I Colonialism, Capitalism and the Discovery of Antarctica; Chapter 1 Colonialism and the Discovery of Antarctica; Chapter 2 Antarctic Exploration, Colonial Capitalism and Circuits of Necessity, 1776'”1850; Part II Class and Antarctic Exploration, 1750'“1850; Chapter 3 The First Antarctic Working Class; Chapter 4 Exploration as Labour, 1750'“1850; Chapter 5 Labour as Exploration: the Fur Frontier; Chapter 6 Antarctic Exploration and the Dialectics of Power; Part III Imperialism and the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration, 1890'“1920; Chapter 7 New Colonialism in Antarctica; Chapter 8 Work and Class in the 'Heroic Age'; Chapter 9 Concluding Reflections;