History Commons^™

Changing Of The Guard In Imperial Ideology Clement Attlee Vs. Winston Churchill, Charles C. Olson

The Thetean: A Student Journal for Scholarly Historical Writing

On 2 February 1927, the young Labour Representative and future Prime Minister Clement Attlee found himself, much to his own surprise, on the shores of Bombay, sent to find solutions to a problem he later termed "virtually insoluble. " His ship arrived to a confused reception of both noisy protesters, waving banners of "Go Back," juxtaposed by a welcoming rain of flowers and leaves by supporters of the visit.' These polar reactions to perceived British intent in India during the late 1920s no doubt showed Attlee the energy of the debate surrounding Indian independence, which only intensified through the coming …

"The Voice Of The People, And Not The Voice Of This House": Legislative Instructions In The Atlantic World And The Irish Struggle For Free Trade, 1779-1780, Ian Mclaughlin

The Thetean: A Student Journal for Scholarly Historical Writing

In 1771, on his way to London to lobby for the American cause, Benjamin Franklin visited the city of Dublin. While there, he visited with several members of che Irish Parliament, especially chose who had their own gripes with British imperialism. "I found [the Irish Patriot Party] disposed to be friends of America," he wrote of che experience to a friend, "in which disposition I endeavored to confirm chem, with the expectation chat our growing weight might in time be thrown into their scale, and, by joining our interest with theirs, might be obtained for chem as well as for …

"Kittenish Appearance:" Western Fashion In Meiji Japan, Harry Zhang

Gettysburg College Headquarters

This paper seeks to examine the degree to which Meiji era Japan adopted Western fashion. It uses written and photographic sources to understand the attitude of Meiji era Japanese towards the introduction of Western fashion into everyday life, and the changing of said attitudes throughout the Meiji era and its implication on Japan's national identity.

The Fundamentalist Nexus Of Neoliberalism, Rentier Capitalism, Religious And Secular Patriarchies, And South Asian Feminist Resistances, Fawzia Afzal-Khan

Wagadu: A Journal of Transnational Women's & Gender Studies

In two case studies from Pakistan, which I then link to Afghanistan (under the Taliban before and after the Soviet/ US proxy war there) as well as the Farmer’s Movement in India—I wish to proffer an intersectional analysis of debates around the issue of women’s rights in the global south. Feminist artivism (art-as-activism), can help build solidarities to mount resistances against globally-inflected state repression in our age of neoliberal economic and religious fundamentalisms, which, working in tandem, seek to roll back the rights of women and minorities in and across South Asia, as elsewhere.

Creating The Cultural “Other”: Ableism, Racism, And Imperialism In The 19th And 20th Centuries, Stephanie Baskin

PANDION: The Osprey Journal of Research and Ideas

This project argues that disability and physical difference were simultaneously both sensationalized and hidden in the United States and the United Kingdom, while also being overemphasized in non-Western countries, with the intention of evoking either revulsion, a sense of racial superiority, or pity, all of which was used as justification for Western imperialism. In order to make this argument, the project looks at varying attitudes and actions toward the disabled, physically different, and visibly ill in the U.K. and U.S.A., as well as the varying attitudes and actions toward the disabled, physically different, and visibly ill in the broader imperial …

“No Concealed Motives”: How The U.S. Came To Dominate Micronesia, Sean F. Senn

The Forum: Journal of History

No abstract provided.

The Peacock Dress: The Language Of British Imperialism In India, 1899-1905, Rebecca Onken

Armstrong Undergraduate Journal of History

This essay aims to discuss the actualization of the imperialist language through the Peacock Dress of Lady Mary Curzon, the new viceroy’s wife in the British colonial India. As the essay argues, the Peacock Dress holds within it a history of appropriation, not appreciation. It highlights the unique colonizing language of the British rule, the racist cloaked as ‘civilizing’ sentiments of the West, the subjugation of the Indian textile industry, and the manifold ways that the British turned their Indian subjects into a colonial Other.

Canadian Financial Imperialism And Structural Adjustment In The Caribbean, Tamanisha J. John

Class, Race and Corporate Power

From the start of the early 1980s, structural adjustment was already normalized in the Caribbean given the power of a variety of self-interested actors, including the U.S., IFIs, and Canadian investors who continued to advance and support— by any means necessary— structural adjustment policies in the Caribbean. Debt traps, coupled with incursions on Caribbean state’s sovereignty would see the neoliberal and capitalist doctrine accepted by all of the independent states in the English-speaking Caribbean region by the mid-1980s. Structural adjustment drastically intensified the existing inequalities in states and removed the ability for governments to alleviate these situations. Alongside Caribbean structural …

التمدين والهجرة والتحولات الاجتماعية في تاريخ الدار البيضاء في ظل إكراهات الماضي وتحديات الحاضر 1912-1981, الكبير عطوف

Dirassat

Title : Urbanization, migration and social transformations in Casablanca's history

The main reason behind the Moroccans' migration from villages to coastal cities in general and to Casablanca in particular is policies of French colonizer. The colonial order caused the peasants to bankrupt forcing them to search for a decent living out of their villages and lands. Besides, the centralization of most investments in Casablanca was one of the reasons which of it a destination for immigrants from various regions of Morocco. The arrival of immigrants towards Casablanca contributed to its rapid economic growth, but it caused several social and environmental …

Flexibly Fluid & Immutably Innate: Perception, Identity, And The Role Of Choice In Race, Emily Lamm

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Chomsky And Genocide, Adam Jones

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

Noam Chomsky may justly be considered the most important public intellectual alive, and the most significant of the post-World War Two era. Despite his scholarly contributions to linguistics, at least three generations know him primarily for his political writings and activism, voicing a left-radical, humanist critique of US foreign policy and other subjects.

Given that a human-rights discourse is prominent in Chomsky’s political writing, and given that genocide-related controversies have sometimes swirled around him, it is worthwhile to consider the overall place and framing of genocide in his published output. The present paper undertakes such an inquiry. It employs a …

Setting The Sun On The British Empire: British Economic Interests And The Decolonization Of Hong Kong, Abby S. Whitlock

James Blair Historical Review

From 1843 to 1997, the United Kingdom ruled Hong Kong, which included Hong Kong Island and the Kowloon Peninsula, as a Crown Colony and British Dependent Territory. Spurred by their initial interests in controlling the opium trade, the British began their colonial role after obtaining Hong Kong from Qing China after the First Opium War and Treaty of Nanking in 1842. Under Britain’s 154 years of rule, the stable nature of British government systems and thorough economic investments caused Hong Kong to become a stable, wealthy international trade center in the twentieth century. How did Britain’s economic focus on Hong …

The Imperial Legacy: An Examination Of The Trends Of Empire And Genocide From German Southwest Africa To The General Government, Laura Guebert

Steeplechase: An ORCA Student Journal

This project is an examination of correlations between imperial enterprises of the Second German Empire and the Nazi Reich through the lenses of global and imperial critiques. The three primary case studies are German Southwest Africa, the Ober Ost, and Nazi-occupied Eastern Europe, particularly the General Government. This research draws heavily on certain themes and theories developed by leading historians of modern German and Eastern European history, including Timothy Snyder, Ben Kiernan, Shelley Baranowski, Vejas Gabriel Liulevicius, and Christopher Browning. By understanding the shared trends of empire and genocide, it is my aim to bring the actions of the National …

Just Like Us: Elizabeth Kendall’S Imperfect Quest For Equality, Kate Rose

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

This essay analyzes United States academic Elizabeth Kendall’s 1913 travelogue A Wayfarer in China through the lenses of gender and criticism of imperialism. In China, Kendall sought to transcend social norms while reflecting empathetically, though sometimes contradictorily, on the lives of the people she encountered. In her travelogue, Kendall is exploring China’s wild areas but also the metaphysical, untamed space beyond conventions in a quest for gender equality and cultural autonomy. She also defends Chinese immigrants in the US at a time of overwhelming anti-Asian prejudice.

Texas, War, And Empire: The American Empire In The Conquest And Annexation Of The Floridas And The American Southwest, Jon A. Welk

The Purdue Historian

Arguments surrounding American Imperialism focus heavily on the 1890s and after, but preceding actions by the United States in the process of continental expansion present an image of imperialism in the first half of the nineteenth century. This paper examines the annexation of Florida, Texas, and the rest of the American Southwest through the lens of Mexican-American relations and international imperial competition to determine whether the United States was exercising an imperial agenda between 1803 and 1848. It then reapplies pre-existing arguments on American imperialism by Frank Ninkovich, Thomas McCormick, Dane Kennedy, and others to the same 1803-1848 timeline as …

The Rise And Fall Of The Zaibatsu: Japan's Industrial And Economic Modernization, David A. C. Addicott

Global Tides

Throughout the past century, the rise and fall of the zaibatsu and the operations of their direct successors has not only shaped Japan’s economic and financial landscape but also has been instrumental in the modernization of the world economy. Many of these corporations traced their roots to Japan’s premodern era, and were directly responsible for the transformation of a nation of rice farmers into an industrial powerhouse in the years prior to World War II. Following Japan’s defeat, these monopolistic corporations were dismantled by the Keynesian economists of the Allied occupation and were reorganized into the keiretsu system, which exists …

When Coca-Cola Grows Citrus On The Nile, Who Wins? Revisiting The End Of The Arab Boycott In Egypt, Andrew Jarnagin

Grand Valley Journal of History

The Coca-Cola Company was barred from the Egyptian market in 1966 under the Arab boycott of Israel and firms conducting business with Israel. The company responded by mobilizing its influence in the American government to assist in negotiations. It succeeded in inking a deal in 1977, two years before Egypt officially ended its participation in the boycott altogether, whereby Coca-Cola agreed to invest $10 million ($39 million in today’s dollars) in agriculture and factory infrastructure, insured by the U.S. government. However, in secret talks in 1975 with the U.S., Egypt had already agreed to end the boycott (thus allowing Coca-Cola …

Traveling The Distance: Danish “Empire Migration” To The U.S. Virgin Islands, Pernille Østergaard Hansen

The Bridge

In 1917, Denmark sold its Caribbean colonies—known at the time as the Danish West Indies—to the United States and thus made its final, official break with the islands of St. Thomas, St. Croix, and St. John. The transfer of the islands to the United States involved a juxtaposition of both rupture and continuity, however. Although the year 1917 marked a significant decline in Danish colonial rule, “new imperial” ideas and practices continued without interruption. Moreover, the transfer did not break Danish ties to the former colony. Several Danes stayed on and continued their island lives, while other Danes chose to …

Feeble To Effeminacy: Race And Gender In The British Imperial Consciousness 1837-1901, Brett Linsley

Grand Valley Journal of History

Scholars of British imperialism have given ample attention to European concepts of race and gender during the Victorian era. Much of the literature has vaguely suggested a symbiotic relationship between the concepts, but failed to assert any definitive theories. The following attempts to fill this gap by putting forward a critical interpretation of the roles that race and gender played in the imperial consciousness during this epoch. The paper demonstrates that the perceptions of race that were rampant on the imperial periphery were the unique synthesis of evolving gender identities in the Victorian metropole.

Rethinking Imperialism And Resistance In West Africa: Historiographic Connections For The Classroom, Michael Christopher Low

Journal of Global Initiatives: Policy, Pedagogy, Perspective

Even in the postcolonial era, West African history remains plagued by Eurocentric myths and media-driven stereotypes. Though specialists have been struggling with this problem for decades, a rift remains between the elite world of academia and the African history being taught in American schools. In an attempt to bridge this gap, this essay provides a case study and a list of suggested resources designed to help nonspecialist world history teachers rethink European colonial power and its impact on our conception of African history. Through its examination of how West African responses to imperialism interacted with, adapted to, and were ultimately …

The Colonial Dynamic: The Xhosa Cattle Killing And The American Indian Ghost Dance, Aaron Mcarthur

Psi Sigma Siren

In 1856, a fourteen year old girl named Nongqawuse (non-see) had a vision on the banks of the Gxarha River in southern Africa. Entranced, she saw dearly departed ancestors, their cattle hiding in the rushes, and she heard other cattle underground waiting to come forth. She was told that if her people would but kill all their cattle, their ancestors would arise from the dead, the cattle lowing in the subterranean passages would come forth, and all the whites would be swept into the sea. Nongqawuse’s prophecy provoked the colonially embittered Xhosa (cōe-săh) people to rise up and kill their …

Harold Marsh Sewall And The Truculent Pursuit Of Empire: Samoa, 1887-1890, Paul T. Burlin

Maine History

The conflict between Thomas F. Bayard, Grover Cleveland's first Secretary of State, and his subordinate, Harold Marsh Sewall of Bath, Maine, who was U.S. consul general to Samoa, was not a disagreement about the goals of American policy. Their disagreement related more to tactical considerations. And at that level, generational differences probably drove them apart. Specifically, the meaning of the Civil War for the younger generation of which Sewall was a part may well have contributed to his “truculent" pursuit of empire, a posture that totally unnerved the older Bayard. Paul T. Burlin is Associate Professor of History and Chair …

The Empire Bites Back: Sherlock Holmes As An Imperial Immune System, Laura Otis

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

Trained as a physician in the bacteriological age, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created a detective-hero who acts both like a masterful bacteriologist and an imperial immune system. Doyle's experiences as a doctor in South Africa taught him that the colonies' microbes were his Empire's worst enemy. In 1890, Doyle visited Berlin, where Robert Koch was testing a "cure" for tuberculosis, and in Doyle's subsequent character sketch of Koch, the scientist sounds remarkably like Sherlock Holmes. Based on Doyle's medical instructor Joe Bell, Holmes shares Koch's relentless drive to hunt down and unmask tiny invaders. Imperialism, by the 1880s, had opened …

"We're Here Because You Were There": Britain's Black Population, Louis Kushnick

Trotter Review

The existence of a black population in Britain is the result of Britain’s imperialist history. The conquest of large parts of the world and their incorporation into a new world system dominated by Britain and other European nations not only created the economic basis of the capitalist system, but also set in motion massive movements of—and, indeed, constructions of—peoples. The creation of the African-American and African-Caribbean peoples are examples of this phenomenon: “We’re here because you were there.”