HSGA 5403
The British Empire
Fall 2012
Nancy Curtin
618 Dealy, x0730
[email protected]
12:30-2:00 Tues.
10:30-11:30 Fri.
or by appointment
Course description
This course examines the history and historiography of the British Empire and
decolonization from the crisis of empire in the late 18th century to decolonization
in the 20th century. We will look at specific case studies, including Ireland, India,
Kenya, and South Africa, to explore a typology and chronology of empire as well
as the more detailed interaction between metropole and periphery, as well as
periphery and periphery. We will also take a more general and critical look at
explanatory metanarratives of empire such as western capitalist expansion,
liberalism and postcolonial theory.
Requirements
Meaningful class participation (including co-leading discussions) – 50%
Paper (20-25 pages) – 50%
You may choose the most appropriate option below:
1) Research Proposal (methodology, review of the literature, preliminary
bibliography of primary and secondary sources)
2) Final essay based on cumulative reading in response to questions to be
set by instructor
All papers are due on December 21; absolutely no extensions
Required Texts
David Anderson, Histories of the Hanged: The Dirty War in Kenya and the End of
Empire (W.W. Norton, 2005) ISBN 0393327540
Partha Chatterjee, The Black Hole of Empire: History of a Global Practice of Power
(Princeton University Press, 2012) ISBN-10: 0691152012
Tony Dodge, Inventing Iraq: The Failure of Nation Building and a History Denied (C.
Hurst & Co., 2012) ISBN-10: 1849040680
Niall Ferguson, Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the
Lessons for Global Power (New York: Basic Books, 2004) ISBN-10: 0465023290
2
Martin Meredith, Diamonds, Gold, and War: The British, the Boers, and the Making of
South Africa (New York: Public Affairs, 2007) ISBN-10: 1586486411
Kate O’Malley, Ireland, India and Empire: Indo-Irish Radical Connections, 1919-64
(Studies in Imperialism) (Manchester University Press, 2010) ISBN-10: 0719081718
Bernard Porter, The Absent-Minded Imperialists: Empire, Society and Culture in
Britain (2006) ISBN 0199299595
Martin J. Wiener, An Empire on Trial: Race, Murder, and Justice under British Rule,
1870-1935 (News York: Cambridge University Press, 2008) ISBN-10: 0521735076
All the above texts are at the bookstore. All articles and book chapters are
available as PDF files on Blackboard
Schedule of Meetings
Aug. 31 -- Empire -- 16th Century to Present
Niall Ferguson, Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and
the Lessons for Global Power
Sept. 7 -- Economics of Empire
P.J. Cain and A.G. Hopkins, “Gentlemanly Capitalism and British
Expansion Overseas I: The Old Colonial System, 1688-1850,” The Economic History
Review, New Series, Vol. 39, No. 4 (Nov., 1986), pp. 501-525
P.J. Cain and A.G. Hopkins, “Gentlemanly Capitalism and British
Expansion Overseas II: New Imperialism, 1850-1945,” The Economic History
Review, New Series, Vol. 40, No. 1 (Feb., 1987), pp. 1-26
Patrick O’Brien, “The Costs and Benefits of British Imperialism, 18461914,” Past and Present, No. 120 (Aug., 1988), pp. 163-200
Paul Kennedy, “The Costs and Benefits of British Imperialism, 1846-1914,”
Past and Present, No. 125 (Nov., 1989), pp. 186-192
Patrick, O’Brien, “The Costs and Benefits of British Imperialism 1846-1914:
Reply,” Past and Present, No. 125 (Nov., 1989), pp. 192-199
Sept. 14 –Edmund Burke and Liberal Imperialism
P. J. Marshall, "The British in Asia: Trade to Dominion, 1700-1765," in The
Oxford History of the British Empire, Vol. II: The Eighteenth Century, ed. P. J.
Marshall (Oxford, 2001), 487-507
H. V. Bowen, "British India, 1765-1813: The Metropolitan Context," in The
Oxford History of the British Empire, Vol. II: The Eighteenth Century, ed. P. J.
Marshall (Oxford, 2001), 530-551
3
Edmund Burke, "Speech on Opening of Impeachment," 15-16 February
1788, in The Writings and Speeches of Edmund Burke, Vol. VI: India: The Launching
of the Hastings Impeachment 1786-1788, ed. P. J. Marshall (Oxford, 1991), 264313, 344-373
Anna Clark, Scandal: The Sexual Politics of the British Constitution
(Princeton, 2004), Ch. 4: “Edmund Burke and the Begums of Oudh: Gender,
Empire, and Public Opinion”
Sara Suleri, The Rhetoric of English India (Chicago, 1992), Ch. 2: “Edmund
Burke and the Indian Sublime” and Ch. 3: “Reading the Trial of Warren
Hastings”
Jennifer Pitts, A Turn to Empire: The Rise of Imperial Liberalism in Britain and
France (Princeton, 2005), Ch. 3: “Burke's Universal Peculiarism,” 59-100
Richard Bourke, "Liberty, Authority, and Trust in Burke's Idea of Empire,"
Journal of the History of Ideas, Vol. 61, No. 3 (Jul. 2000), 453-471
Sept. 21 –An Empire of Law
Martin J. Wiener, An Empire on Trial: Race, Murder, and Justice under British
Rule, 1870-1935
Sept. 28 -- The Technologies of Dominance
Partha Chatterjee, The Black Hole of Empire: History of a Global Practice
of Power
Daniel R. Headrick, “The Tools of Imperialism: Technology and the
Expansion of European Colonial Empires in the Nineteenth Century,” The Journal
of Modern History, Vol. 51, No. 2 (Jun., 1979), pp. 231-263
Oct. 5– A Violent Empire
Jock McCulloch, ”Empire and Violence, 1900-1939” in Gender and Empire,
ed. Phillippa Levine (Oxford, 2004), pp. 220-239
Purnima Bose; Laura Lyons, “Dyer Consequences: The Trope of Amritsar,
Ireland, and the Lessons of the "Minimum" Force Debate,” boundary 2, Vol. 26,
No. 2 (Summer, 1999), pp. 199-229.
Barbara English, “The Kanpur Massacres in India in the Revolt of 1857,”
Past and Present, No. 142 (Feb., 1994), pp. 169-178
Rudrangshu Mukherjee, “’Satan Let Loose upon Earth’: The Kanpur
Massacres in India in the Revolt of 1857,” Past and Present, No. 128 (Aug., 1990),
pp. 92-116
Rudrangshu Mukherjee, “The Kanpur Massacres in India in the Revolt of
1857: Reply,” Past and Present, No. 142 (Feb., 1994), pp. 178-189
Derek Sayer, “British Reaction to the Amritsar Massacre 1919-1920,” Past
and Present, No. 131 (May, 1991), pp. 130-164
4
Oct. 12 -- Gender, Race and Sexuality
Mrinalini Sinha , “Britishness, Clubbability, and the Colonial Public
Sphere: The Genealogy of an Imperial Institution in Colonial India” The Journal of
British Studies, Vol. 40, No. 4 (Oct., 2001), pp. 489-521
Seymour Drescher, “The Ending of the Slave Trade and the Evolution of
European Scientific Racism,” Social Science History, Vol. 14, No. 3 (Autumn, 1990),
pp. 415-450
Douglas Lorimer, “Theoretical Racism in Late-Victorian Anthropology,
1870-1900,” Victorian Studies, Vol. 31, No. 3 (Spring, 1988), pp. 405-430
Anna Davin, “Imperialism and Motherhood” in Tensions of Empire:
Colonial Cultures in a Bourgeois World, ed. Frederick Cooper and Ann Laura Stoler
(Berkeley, 1997), pp. 87-151
Partha Chatterjee, “The Nation and its Women” in A Subaltern Studies
Reader, 1986-1995, ed. Ranajit Guha (Minnesota, 1997), pp. 240-263
Jeremy Martens, “A Transnational History of Immigration Restriction:
Natal and New South Wales, 1896–97, The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth
History, Vol. 34, No. 3 (2006), pp. 323-44
David M. Anderson, “ Sexual Threat and Settler Society: ‘Black Perils’ in
Kenya, c. 1907–30,” The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, Vol. 38, No.
1 (2010), pp. 47-74
Oct. 19-- Sport and Empire
Joseph S. Alter, "Indian Clubs and Colonialism: Hindu Masculinity and
Muscular Christianity." Comparative Studies in Society and History, Vol. 46, No. 3
(Jul., 2004), pp. 497-534
Ramachandra Guha, "Cricket and Politics in Colonial India," Past & Present,
No. 161 (Nov., 1998), pp. 155-190
Mary A. Procida, "Good Sports and Right Sorts: Guns, Gender, and
Imperialism in British India." The Journal of British Studies, Vol. 40, No. 4, At
Home in the Empire (Oct., 2001), pp. 454-488
John Rosselli,. "The Self-Image of Effeteness: Physical Education and
Nationalism in Nineteenth-Century Bengal," Past & Present, No. 86 (Feb., 1980),
pp. 121-148
Joseph Sramek, "’Face Him Like a Briton’: Tiger Hunting, Imperialism, and
British Masculinity in Colonial India, 1800-1875," Victorian Studies, Vol. 48, No. 4
(Summer, 2006), pp. 659-680
Brian Stoddart, "Sport, Cultural Imperialism, and Colonial Response in the
British Empire," Comparative Studies in Society and History, Vol. 30, No. 4 (Oct.,
1988), pp. 649-673
5
Oct. 26 -- Free traders, Freebooters and Christian Missionaries
Brian Stanley, “'Commerce and Christianity': Providence Theory, the
Missionary Movement, and the Imperialism of Free Trade, 1842-1860,” The
Historical Journal, Vol. 26, No. 1 (Mar., 1983), pp. 71-94
Andrew Porter, “'Commerce and Christianity': The Rise and Fall of a
Nineteenth-Century Missionary Slogan,” The Historical Journal, Vol. 28, No. 3
(Sep., 1985), pp. 597-621
Felix Driver, “Henry Morton Stanley and His Critics: Geography,
Exploration and Empire,” Past and Present, No. 133 (Nov., 1991), pp. 134-166
John Darwin, “Imperialism and the Victorians: The Dynamics of
Territorial Expansion,” The English Historical Review, Vol. 112, No. 447 (Jun.,
1997), pp. 614-642
Susan Thorne, “‘The Conversion of Englishmen and the Conversion of the
World Inseparable’: Missionary Imperialism and the Language of Class in Early
Industrial Britain’’ in Tensions of Empire: Colonial Cultures in a Bourgeois World, ed.
Frederick Cooper and Ann Laura Stoler (Berkeley, 1997), pp. 238-262
Nov. 2 – South Africa
Martin Meredith, Diamonds, Gold, and War: The British, the Boers, and the
Making of South Africa
Nov. 9-- The Middle East
Tony Dodge, Inventing Iraq: The Failure of Nation Building and a History
Denied
Eitan Bar-Yosef,“The Last Crusade? British Propaganda and the Palestine
Campaign, 1917-18,” Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 36, No. 1 (Jan., 2001),
pp. 87-109
P. J. Cain, “Character and Imperialism: The British Financial
Administration of Egypt, 1878–1914,” The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth
History, Vol. 34 No.2 (2006), pp. 177-200
Jacob Norris, “Repression and Rebellion: Britain's Response to the Arab
Revolt in Palestine of 1936–39,” The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History,
Vol. 36 No. 1(2008), pp. 25-45
Nov. 16 -- Empire Strikes Back
Kate O’Malley, Ireland, India and Empire: Indo-Irish Radical Connections,
1919-64
Michael Silvestri, “’The Sinn Fein of India’: Irish Nationalism and the
Policing of Revolutionary Terrorism in Bengal,” The Journal of British Studies, Vol.
39, No. 4 (Oct., 2000), pp. 454-486
C. A. Bayly, “Ireland, India and the Empire: 1780-1914,” Transactions of the
Royal Historical Society, 6th Ser., Vol. 10 (2000), pp. 377-397
6
Nov. 30 – Decolonization: Kenya
David Anderson, Histories of the Hanged: The Dirty War in Kenya and the End
of Empire
Dec. 7-- The Empire at Home
Bernard Porter, The Absent-Minded Imperialists: Empire, Society and Culture
in Britain
Dec. 14 – Imagined Empire – Imperialism and Popular Culture
Patrick A. Dunae, “Boys' Literature and the Idea of Empire, 1870-1914,”
Victorian Studies, Vol. 24, No. 1 (Autumn, 1980), pp. 105-121
Wendy Webster, "’There'll Always Be an England’: Representations of
Colonial Wars and Immigration, 1948-1968,” The Journal of British Studies, Vol. 40,
No. 4 (Oct., 2001), pp. 557-584
Anne M. Windholz, “An Emigrant and a Gentleman: Imperial
Masculinity, British Magazines, and the Colony That Got Away,” Victorian
Studies, Vol. 42, No. 4 (Summer, 1999 - Summer, 2000), pp. 631-658
Martin Hall, “The Legend of the Lost City; Or, the Man with Golden
Balls,” Journal of Southern African Studies, Vol. 21, No. 2 (Jun., 1995), pp. 179-199
Andrew S. Thompson, “The Language of Imperialism and the Meanings
of Empire: Imperial Discourse in British Politics, 1895-1914,” The Journal of British
Studies, Vol. 36, No. 2 (Apr., 1997), pp. 147-177
J.A. Mangan, “’The Grit of Our Forefathers’: Invented Traditions,
Propaganda and Imperialism” in Imperialism and Popular Culture, ed. John M.
MacKenzie (Manchester, 1986), pp. 113-139
J.S. Bratton, “Of England, Home and Duty: The Image of England in
Victorian and Edwardian Juvenile Fiction” in Imperialism and Popular Culture, ed.
John M. MacKenzie (Manchester, 1986), pp. 74-93
Allen Warren, “Citizens of the Empire: Baden-Powell, Scouts and Guides
and an Imperial Ideal, 1900-1940” in Imperialism and Popular Culture, ed. John M.
MacKenzie (Manchester, 1986), pp. 232-56
Elaine Showalter, Sexual Anarchy: Gender and Culture at the Fin de Siecle
(New York, 1990), ch. 5, “King Romance”
John M. MacKenzie, “The Popular Culture of Empire in Britain” in The Oxford
History of the British Empire, Vol. IV: The Twentieth Century, ed. Judith M. Brown and
William Roger Louis (Oxford, 1999), pp. 212-231