A key scholarly debate in late colonial law concerns the interpretation of the ‘reasonable man’. The reasonable man, whose paradigmatic status was itself a contested subject for English law, was all the more problematic for colonial law when the idea of a ‘reasonable native’ was presumed in and of itself to be questionable. Should the ‘native’ be held to the same standard of reasonableness as the Englishman? And if not, what standard of reason was valid? This article examines how popular literature of the period, both fiction and memoir, reflects these concerns. Focusing on accounts of colonial Nigeria, I show how this literature repeatedly complicates the perceived ‘reasonableness’ of both Europeans and colonial subjects. Moreover, I demonstrate that these complications, frequently dramatized through narratives of the uncanny, make visible colonial anxieties about the distinction between native custom and colonial authority.

中文翻译：

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尼日利亚殖民地的“理性人”

殖民地晚期法律的一个主要学术辩论涉及对“合理人”的解释。理性的人，其范式地位本身就是英国法律的一个有争议的主题，而当人们认为“合理的本土人”的概念本身存在问题时，它对于殖民地法律就更成问题了。“本地人”是否应与英国人保持相同的合理性标准？如果不是，那么什么合理的理由标准有效？本文探讨了这段时期的流行文学，无论是小说还是回忆录，都反映了这些担忧。着眼于殖民地尼日利亚的叙述，我展示了这些文献如何使欧洲人和殖民主体的“合理性”一再复杂化。而且，我证明了这些并发症，通常是通过对怪诞小说的叙述而戏剧化的，