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This thesis is a study of Victorian views about seance phenomena, focusing on the phenomena associated with D.D. Home, by far the best-known and most impressive of Victorian mediums. The study is based primarily on the debate within the periodical press from Home’s arrival in Britain in 1855 to the publication of his last book in 1877, and is in eight chapters. Chapter one locates Victorian views about seance phenomena within a broader Victorian worldview, by outlining how historians have discussed not only Victorian spiritualism but broader aspects of Victorian science and religion, and aspects of Orientalism. It then describes the sources to be used in the study, and discusses how they have been approached by the author. In the light of questions concerning historical methodology, and of certain non-historical literature on anomalous beliefs, it argues that the most appropriate question to ask is: How did Victorians <i>frame</i> Home’s phenomena? Chapter two provides background information on Home, his witnesses and critics, and the metropolitan environment within which discussion about his phenomena primarily took place. It then sets up the themes of the next four chapters by arguing that, from the beginning, Home’s phenomena were framed in relation to four questions: Were they the result of trickery?; Were the objectively real?; Were they the result of a new natural force?; and Were they due to supernatural agency? The next four chapters discuss these themes in depth, and in relation to broader Victorian concerns. In doing so, they stress the inadequacies of the arguments that framed Home’s phenomena either as trickery or as the result of purely subjective experiences, and argue that any contemporary considering the question would have been aware of these inadequacies. They also consider how seance phenomena that lacked an adequate alternative explanation challenged orthodox science, and had implications for debates about Biblical miracles. Chapter seven then considers the link between such phenomena and views of Indian magic. It outlines how Victorians viewed Indian magic, noting an increasing tendency from the 1870s to view it as something other than trickery, then argues such a shift is best explained by mid-Victorian comparisons between seance phenomena and Indian magic.

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This thesis examines the attitudes, experiences and activities of Britain's first marxist socialist organization, the Social-Democratic Federation, and how its relationship with trade unionism emerged and evolved in the period from 1884 to 1901. The objectives of this study are two-fold. First, it attemrts to provide certain general insights into the issues and problems involved in the analysis of trade unionism, with Farticular emphasis on the various marxist socialist tendencies in political thought which were present in the SDF. Second, it attempts to provide a detailed understanding of the ideas and activities of various SDF members who made important contributions to the development of British trade unionism during the final two decades of the 19th century. To achieve these objectives a number of questions are raised, and answers to them suggested. These include: What basic analysis of trade unionism did Marx and Engels develop in their basic texts which were available to the British SDF? How did the Social-Democratic strategic and theoretical analysis develop over the years until 1901? What specific issues and alternatives strategies were examined in the course of Social-Democratic debates on unionism? In what activities and organisational ventures did SDF members become involved? How did British SDF attitudes compare to those expressed by marxist socialists in other parties and countries? The answers suggested to these questions lead to a brief discussion of a central issue in labour political theory, namely, the nature of the complex relationship between the broad objectives of social revolution and the gradualist perspective of general trade unionism. _ý, s .n The information in this thesis is derived from a detailed study of publications produced by SDF members during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Particular attention was given to a close reading of the weekly SDF newspaper, Justice. These sources were the primary medium to which SDF debates took place, advice given and activities reported. These main sources of information are supplemented by reference to secondary studies on the social, economic, political biographic and trade union contexts to the study. Extensive references are also made to the comments and reports of other contemporary socialist and radical groups, and to many local and national commercial publications, as well as to certain memoirs and unpublished materials.

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