Daisy Miller’s Elimination: A Post-Colonial Social Darwinist Theory

Abstract

This essay historicizes and investigates social Darwinism and social eugenics as
they appear in Henry James’s Daisy Miller, using postcolonial theories such as mimicry,
imperialistic discourse, and reverse diaspora. Henry James's personal travel writings, which
contain an element of xenophobic anxiety, are also discussed. In addition, the essay argues
that Daisy is extracted suddenly from the text on two levels: The first level is located within
the fictive narration; i.e., she is not socially desirable by the colonialist Europeanized
Americans with whom she encounters in Europe. The second level exists within the reality of
Henry James’s fears of the “other” and within the context of the historical time period in
which the text was written.