Category: Imperial & Global History

Fighting the Myths of the First World War

Published on by CIGH Exeter10 Comments
Television - BBC - Blackadder Goes Forth - Rowan Atkinson and Tony Robinson - London
Rowan Atkinson as Cpt. Edmund Blackadder (left). Tony Robinson as Private Baldrick (right).

Marc-William Palen

Did you miss this weekend’s intellectual battle over the myths of the First World War? Here are the highlights.

Round 1, Gove v. Evans

Late last week, Education Secretary Michael Gove fired off the year’s opening salvo in the pages of the Daily Mail in ‘Why Does the Left Insist on Belittling True British Heroes?’ As the title suggests (and now with support from Stephen Pollard in the Express and UKIP’s Nigel Farage in the Independent), Gove attempts to situate the debate as a Left v. Right political issue (for which Professor Gary Sheffield has taken him to task). Continue reading “Fighting the Myths of the First World War” →

Human Rights and ‘Neoliberalism’

Published on by CIGH Exeter3 Comments

Samuel Moyn

Samuel Moyn
James Bryce Professor of European Legal History, Columbia University

Cross-posted from Humanitarianism and Human Rights
9/12/13

Much ink has now been spilled on the historical origins of human rights. That debate will continue no doubt. I have surveyed the wreckage in a recent review essay (in English here, but for some similar thoughts auf Deutsch see here) but there is no doubt that problems large and small remain to resolve.

One of the biggest is how to formulate the historical relationship between humanitarianism and human rights. In my view, the best thing to say is that the former is old and the latter (conceptualized as the quest for an international regime pursued by transnational movements) is new, though humanitarianism certainly did create many   norms originally framed outside an individualist or rights-based paradigm that contemporary movements have now put in one. Continue reading “Human Rights and ‘Neoliberalism’” →

Over 1 Million Historical Images Made Available by British Library

Published on by CIGH Exeter1 Comment

Marc-William Palen

[London, 1857] Image taken from page 464 of 'The eventful voyage of H.M. Discovery Ship “Resolute” to the Arctic Regions in search of Sir J. Franklin. ... To which is added an account of her being fallen in with by an American Whaler after her abandonment ... and of her [from the British Library Images Collection]
[London, 1857] Image taken from page 464 of ‘The eventful voyage of H.M. Discovery Ship “Resolute” to the Arctic Regions in search of Sir J. Franklin. … To which is added an account of her being fallen in with by an American Whaler after her abandonment … and of her [courtesy of the British Library]

Need some new visual resources for next term’s imperial or global history class? The British Library has now made available over 1 million images dating from the 17th to the 19th century. Continue reading “Over 1 Million Historical Images Made Available by British Library” →

Buying British Across the World

Published on by CIGH Exeter

David Thackeray

An Empire Marketing Board poster from the late 1920s
An Empire Marketing Board poster from the late 1920s

This autumn I spoke at several universities in Australia and New Zealand on the subject of the various shopping weeks that were launched to promote Empire trade during the 1920s and 1930s. The story of the Empire Marketing Board’s efforts to develop the idea of ‘Buying Empire’ in inter-war Britain is well known, and its posters still appear regularly on the covers of books written about imperial culture (and also currently featured as the background to this blog!). What is less well known is that the same cause was taken up with enthusiasm by a variety of organisations in the Dominions, and arguably achieved greater and more lasting prominence there than it did in Britain.

At the same time, it quickly became clear to me that the archives in England and Australasia were telling different stories. Politicians and businessmen in Wellington and Melbourne may have conceived themselves to be members of a ‘British’ trade community, but their understanding of what the future of the Empire as an economic unit should be often differed from their counterparts in London. Continue reading “Buying British Across the World” →

Welcome to the Imperial & Global Forum

Published on by CIGH Exeter13 Comments

Globus_book-shelf_hgAndrew Thompson
Centre Director

It is a pleasure to welcome you to the Imperial & Global Forum, the blog of the Centre for Imperial and Global History at the History Department, University of Exeter. In it, contributors will tackle the controversies of empire and globalization, past and present. So please be sure to follow along, join in the discussion, and give us feedback on the blog, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

We are one of the largest UK research groups working on the history of modern empires and their importance for understanding the making of our contemporary world. If you go to our Centre website you will find more details about the range of staff involved, the variety of countries they study, and the work they have recently published. You will also be able to learn more of some of the major collaborative projects that are supported by the Centre, the particular colleagues who are involved in them, and the impact they are having within and beyond the academic world. Continue reading “Welcome to the Imperial & Global Forum” →

In Defense of Global History

Published on by CIGH Exeter13 Comments

worldconnectingphotoMarc-William Palen
Follow on Twitter @MWPalen

[Update: Please also read Professor Bell’s response.]

A recent New Republic article by David A. Bell on the limitations of the ‘global turn’ has been making the rounds this month, and deservedly so. Bell’s article reviews Emily Rosenberg’s 2012 edited volume A World Connecting: 1870-1945. [1] Nestled within it, however, is a much larger critique of the global historiographical shift toward ‘networks’ and ‘globalization’.

Bell’s criticisms are provocative. They are eloquent.

But are they fair? Let’s take a look. Continue reading “In Defense of Global History” →