Marc-William Palen
History Department, University of Exeter
Follow on Twitter @MWPalen

From the Deep Roots of Afro-Asia, to Mumbai’s Tata Empire, here are this week’s top picks in imperial and global history.

The Deep Roots of Afro-Asia

Keisha N. Blain
African American Intellectual History Society

More often than not, when my students hear the terms “Afro-Asian solidarity,” they usually point to the Rush Hour movies, featuring the talented duo Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker. When I taught a group of high school students last summer, their faces lit up when they suspected I might show a clip from one of the movies. They were wrong. I showed a video clip of Fred Ho and his Afro Asian Musical Ensemble instead. I wanted my students to think about Afro-Asia as part of our ongoing conversation about the meanings and functions of black internationalism. Since none of them had heard of Fred Ho (1957-2014), I was also excited to introduce them to this musical genius, writer, and activist.

My students were astute to draw a connection to Rush Hour. Our popular memory continues to associate Afro-Asia with a myriad of cultural productions including novels—i.e. Frank Chin’s Gunga Din Highway and Ishmael Reed’s Japanese by Spring—and films such as Unleashed, Cradle 2 the Grave, and Rising Sun. The Rush Hour movies, first released in 1998, certainly exemplify the cultural manifestations of Afro-Asia even as they perpetuate racial and ethnic stereotypes.¹ Describing Rush Hour 2, in particular, Crystal Anderson argues that the film “embraces interethnic male friendship, but only on the basis of a reductive notion of national identity, which reinforces the distance between the African American and Chinese leads.” ² This is true but I also think the portrayals of two police detectives—one African American and the other Chinese—working in tandem to fight crime in the United States and abroad symbolically allude to a richer, deeper, and dynamic history. [continue reading]

Ripping Yarns: How a British Empire Novelist Has Become the Darling of the American Right

Mark Woods
Christian Today

A Victorian author of ripping yarns about great figures from history and plucky empire-builders is enjoying a renaissance thanks to a children’s ‘audio theatre’ series and the growth of the Christian ‘homeschool’ movement in the US. G A Henty (1832-1902) was a novelist and war correspondent who wrote historical adventure stories such as The Dragon and the Raven, Through Russian Snows – about Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow in 1812 – and Under Drake’s Flag. Henty was a firm believer in the virtues of the British Empire and set a template for uplifting stories which was followed in journals such as the Boys’ Own Paper and Chums. Authors such as Frederick Brereton and Percy F Westerman, author of The Wireless Officer, also wrote in the ‘Henty tradition’.