This article forms a critique on the formation of a colonial historiography concerning the interactions of the maritime 'Ostend Company' (GIC) in eighteenth century China and India. This historiography has ignored aspects of intercultural communication, which provided the conditions of possibility for any further interaction and exchange. The conceptual influence of colonialism on this discourse, and its recuperation of the Ostend Company's interactions in Bengal, are traced through its manifestations in historiography as well as popular visual culture. This is contrasted with a source-based approach which sheds new light on vital issues of courtly communication as a learning process involving specific acts and symbols.
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