Nearly Native, Barely Civilized: Henri Gaden S Journey Through Colonial French West Africa (1894-1939): Henri Gaden’s Journey Through Colonial French West Africa (1894-1939) (African History, 3) - Softcover

'The book does not aim to simply reconstruct a conventional historical narrative of a life or of event as they unfold. It sheds light on the nature of the colonialism in West Africa. Through Gaden's experience we can see how colonialism imposes order and new types of organization on native affairs. Gaden does not act merely as a military officer and administrator. In Mauritania, he was revered as a man of learning, justice and honesty, and of immense culture stature amongst the Moors. He is a researcher and an ethnographer who seeks information from the indigenous, notices and writes down Africa's world. Overall, Dilley achieves its scope, to present us a rather unknown Africa through the optics of their protagonists.'

Antonios Chaldeos in Journal of Oriental and African Studies, 24 (2015), pp. 482-485

Nearly Native, Barely Civilized by Roy Dilley offers an in-depth, intimate and rounded biography of Henri Gaden (1867-1939), an exceptional colonial soldier, ethnographer and linguist, lover, father, administrator and Governor, who lived for 45 years in French West Africa.