Robert Johnson, The British Empire: Pomp, Power and Postcolonialism

This brief study of Imperialism offers a concise overview of Britain’s role in Colonialism, the slavery issue, the British Raj and the scramble for Africa, and probes the motives for empire and continuing issues of post-colonialism.

Contents

I: A Journey over Palm and Pine: An Overview of Histories, Peoples and Developments 1. Early Colonialism: Exploration, Exploitation and Chartered Companies; 2. The Company Raj (India) and the Loss of the American Colonies; 3. Slavery, Anti-Slavery, Liberalism and Imperialism; 4. Imperial Expansion in the Nineteenth Century; 5. War, Retreat and Transformation in the Twentieth Century
II: Problems in Interpretation: Historiography, Post-Colonialism and Sources 6. Historiography: approaches to the history of the British Empire; 7. Post-Colonialism: Explanation and Evaluation; 8. Sources: Eurocentrism, the ‘silenced’ sources, and the problem of ‘representation’
III: Issues and Debates 9. Controversies over the Motives for Empire; 10. The Colonies of Settlement: Colonisation, Identities and Narratives; 11. The Nature of Imperialism: How did the British Empire Function? 12. Collaboration and Resistance; 13. Race, Class and Gender

Robert Johnson

Rob Johnson is a History Lecturer at Warwick University, England. He is the author of a number of publications including British Imperialism: Histories and Controversies (Palgrave, 2002); and his most recent books are Spying for Empire: The Great Game in Central and South Asia, 1757–1947 (Greenhill 2006), and A Region in Turmoil: South Asian Conflicts, 1947–2001 (Reaktion, 2005). Prior to his academic career, Rob was a Captain in the British Army. In his spare time he leads adventurous expeditions to remote parts of the world and he is currently writing a new history of conflict in Central Asia.