Elements for a Cultural Etymology of Censorship in English-Speaking Countries, from the 16th to the 21st Century

The numerous existing critical studies on the phenomenon of censorship underline the epistemological difficulties attached to it as a result of the diversity of censorship cases and their ideological and cultural contexts. When analysing the early modern period, the issue is even more problematic in so far as our perception of censorship tends to be tainted by contemporary phenomena attached to our conception of the freedom of expression. The aim of this paper is to establish a number of critical perspectives for a cultural etymology of censorship in the specific field of English-speaking countries in order to show that the contradictory impulses that marked the early modern period in England concerning the status of books and paintings (bibliolatry/ idolatry and biblioclasm/iconoclasm) reverberate onto the following centuries and help us apprehend the definition and cultural function of censorship in English-speaking cultures.