Men, science, travel and nature in the eighteenth and nineteenth-century cape

Ecofeminist writing has re-evaluated the Western scientific revolution as a n essentially male enterprise which classified and exploited nature, as wal l as facilitating the domination of women and colonised peoples. Mary Louis e Pratt's Imperial Eyes extends this analysis by focusing on European scien tific travellers in the extra-European world in the late eighteenth and ear ly nineteenth centuries. At a general level, over a long period of time, th ere is force in this argument. But this article argues for a more fluid app roach to masculinity and science. In exploring the writings of some visitin g scientists at the Cape, especially Anders Sparrman and William Burchell, it highlights their role in developing alternative visions of social intera ction and the natural world. The article concludes with an assessment of th e position of Mary Barber, one of the first women at the Cape to receive re cognition as a natural scientist; while she was subordinated to men in colo nial scientific work, her life illustrates that women could be absorbed in these activities and that their views about nature and indigenous people di d not necessarily differ from those of the men amongst whom they worked.