Constructing a Humanitarian Self: Emily Hobhouse's Auto/biographical Traces, 1899-1926

Taking the recognition of the interplays between biography and autobiography - hence, auto/biography - as its starting point, this paper explores the auto/biographical traces of the British social reformer and humanitarian Emily Hobhouse (1860-1926). Following her rise to public prominence during and after the 1899-1902 South African War, Hobhouse made a sustained attempt to testify to her humanitarianism in a number of different auto/biographical forms, all of them incorporating Boer women’s accounts of suffering in the war. We consider the implications of Schaffer and Smith’s (2004) ‘ethics of recognition’ for Hobhouse’s construction of her humanitarian authority, and the processes by which the accounts themselves become 'untouchable' testimonies. In examining the many iterations of Hobhouse’s life writing as emotional practices, we explore her felt morality, grapple with her urge to personal accountability, and consider how her auto/biography was co-produced in South Africa, and to what purposes.