For over two decades, Manchester Studies in Imperialism has been a trailblazer in the realm of imperial history. Positioned firmly at the forefront, this series has illuminated the annals of history and transformed our understanding of empire.
Pioneering perspectives
The Studies in Imperialism series has embarked on a transformative journey, reshaping not only British history but also the vast landscape of imperial histories. It has boldly expanded boundaries, delving into uncharted territories, and shining a light on subjects that were once overlooked. More importantly, it has masterfully unveiled the intricate and inseparable relationships between these domains.
A treasury of knowledge
Within the pages of Manchester Studies in Imperialism lies a treasure trove of scholarly exploration. It unveils the rich tapestry of cultural encounters between colonisers and the colonised, shedding light on the intricate web of power that flows through the production and organisation of colonial knowledge. It unravels the complex construction of identity, both at the heart and on the peripheries of empire.
2025 Manchester Studies in Imperialism
This chapter covers the beginning years of the IODE, through to the end of the First World War, and introduces the ‘racial hierarchy’ of the IODE and its preference for British immigration. It covers the IODE's work with immigrants and its maternal wartime labour. The IODE was not a pacifist organisation, as, during the First World War, the goal was victory for Canada and the Empire. Its military involvement refutes the arguments of some contemporary theorists, who consider war and peace as opposites, with women as ‘beautiful souls’ and life-givers, and men as ‘just warriors’ and life-takers. During the IODE's first years, immigration and war work had in common the intended construction of a strong British Canada. The IODE was able to use its élite social status and gender to achieve its objectives. It supported a ‘racial hierarchy’ which asserted that British people and their Anglo-Celtic Canadian descendants were superior to all other races, and discriminatory immigration laws which legislated this preference.
This chapter presents the initiatives taken by Sir Garnet Wolseley, who was appointed by the British Government as administrator and commander-in-chief on the Gold Coast on 13 August 1873. He was despatched with twenty-seven special-service officers to work with the local Fante tribesmen to resist the Asante. He promptly requested British reinforcements after his arrival in September, planned a short campaign over the less hazardous months of December, January and February, and then decisively defeated the Asante in battle before sacking their capital, Kumase. His skepticism about the resolve, reliability and martial prowess of the coastal tribes, particularly if required to fight in the bush, was widely shared by British officers and men. He continued to employ native auxiliaries and requested the dispatch of British soldiers. He accepted Cardwell's instructions that ‘every preparation should be made in advance’, that the forces should not be disembarked until the decisive moment occurred, and that they should operate only in the most favorable climatic conditions, namely the four months from December to March.
The chapter offers a genealogy of the IODE, detailing the structure of the organisation and placing it in imperial context. It shows how the IODE's set-up has itself represented its vision for Anglo-Canadian identity, and Canada's place within the Empire. The IODE fitted very closely with the imperial propaganda clubs, a number of which were founded at the end of the nineteenth century in Canada and other parts of the Empire. These were conservative movements that sought to foster imperial patriotism. Furthermore, patriotic expression was the initial primary objective of the IODE. Formed during wartime, the IODE set out to bolster and support nation and Empire, and all work took place in a patriotic context that was concerned with citizenship. In this way, it differed from other charitable organisations that did not have patriotism as their primary concern. As an organisation of female imperialists, the IODE was situated between the mostly male patriotic clubs and the women's organisations.
By the time George Lamming wrote In the Castle of My Skin, he was able to translate the fear, misery and violence he had witnessed into a sophisticated literary analysis of the complexities of poverty and powerlessness. His arrival in Britain coincided with an explosion of Caribbean literature and poetry. Freedom was essential if the individual was to become fully human and the ego whole rather than incomplete. For Lamming, the search for authenticity necessitated a profound reworking of the colonial relationship. All of Lamming's fiction is concerned with migrants, leaving or returning to the Caribbean. He has been as involved in politics as in literature and for over a decade published no novels, focusing instead on critical, editorial and political work. His aesthetics led him to reflect on authenticity and oppression, to translate those philosophical musings into political action and critical reflection on the lingering impact of colonialism.
George Padmore represents a particular variant on the theme of emigration which underwrites the story of twentieth-century Caribbean intellectuals. He was an intellectual formed deep in the vortex of the age of extremes, and for most of his life he espoused positions which others perceived to be both extreme and fanatical. He was also inducted into politics in the USA and through Communism, though from the outset he was fired by the injustices of race and colonialism. The main contours of Padmore's political thought from the days of The Negro Worker to the time of the Pan-African Congress in Manchester in October 1945 are reviewed. Padmore showed every sign that he had mastered the culture of the colonisers, having learned to inhabit Englishness at perfect pitch. He expressed the elementary truth that colonialism has neither moral nor intellectual justification.
This chapter focuses on the accomplishments of Gordon, once appointed governor-general of the Sudan. Gordon felt compelled to remain in Khartoum and the Government did not have courage order him to withdraw. The Government endorsed the plans of Wolseley and his Red River veterans for an expedition up the Nile as a purportedly less expensive, less risky and less difficult option than constructing a railway from Suakin to Berber, with another 200 miles upstream to Khartoum. The ensuing expedition involved the despatch of 9,000 men and 40,000 tons of stores and munitions up the Nile. Wolseley arrived in Cairo on 9 September 1884, with plans to send his soldiers by train and steamer to Wadi Halfa, then south of the second cataract by specially designed whale-boats. Wolseley's forces remained in the Sudan until mid-summer despite failing to relieve Gordon, who was killed in the storming of Khartoum (26 January 1885), and Graham commanded another 13,000 soldiers in operations near Suakin.
This chapter focuses on the progress of missions with the history, the literature, the customs, and the mythology of Indian people, and which combined a general view of this interesting field, with the advancement of the truth. The notion of caste emerged during the formative stages of the British imagination of India. Caste attracted the hostility of evangelicals because it was seen as a powerful barrier to conversion, enlightenment and progress, and the mainstay of arguments against intervention in Indian customs. And yet caste was understood with neither rigour nor consistency. The term caste was used interchangeably with race, sect, tribe and even nation to denote a population seen to possess common traits. Indeed, it was this versatility that promoted the cavalier use of caste to provide pseudo-scientific status to theories on the nature of Indian society.
This chapter traces the story of the expansion of the British Empire up to the mid-1830s in North America, southern Africa and Australasia, and offers a subsequent reappraisal of colonial administration in these regions. An overview of Britain's gradual acquisition of settler colonies as men and women of European origin appropriated Indigenous peoples' lands in these regions is presented. In the later 1830s, British imperial policies towards the rights of the Indigenous peoples of the Empire, and towards the political rights of settlers, made as they were from the British Empire's center in London, showed a degree of uniformity. The settler colonies later diverged from the central control to form their own governments. The key tensions from which these differing paths emerged can be illustrated by examining the content, recommendations and subsequent implementation of two influential reports, both emanating from the British Parliament of the 1830s: the Report of the Select Committee on Aborigines of 1837 and the Report on the Affairs of British North America, or the Durham Report, of 1839.
This chapter puts forward the idea of racial theory. The pioneering Henry Mayhew borrowed freely from contemporary racial theory, and putative logic was undermined by the plurality of empirical material on the experience of the poor recorded in the corpus of his work. The trope of racialization locates shifts in the construction of the poor within the imperial formation, and provides a more satisfactory explanation of their chronology and nature than those focusing exclusively on domestic politics and social policy. The chapter explores the workings of this symbolic process. To understand the active construction of racial identities in this period, there is a need to go beyond the convention of identifying characteristics of racial stereotyping, to an investigation of the subtle and powerful mechanisms through which they were created. The chapter also considers how modernist impulses transformed the discursive realm of the poor. Toward the end of the century anonymous crowds from an unknown abyss surfaced upon the urban landscape; race, however, remained the principal referent.
This chapter provides the information on several interventions in Egypt that contrasted with recent campaigns in Africa and Afghanistan. The interventions in Egypt involved the largest expeditionary force despatched by Britain since the Crimean War and achieved a decisive outcome in less than two months. The campaign avoided any reverses such that Isandlwana, Maiwand or Majuba, and reflected impressive co-operation between the armed services. The intervention was a response to the growth of the nationalist movement in Egypt under the military leadership of Arabi Pasha, the Egyptian minister of war, and its burgeoning hostility towards European control over Khedive Tewfik's Government and its finances. This hostility reached a crescendo when riots erupted in Alexandria (11 June 1882), involving the so-called massacre of Christians and the flight of many Europeans. The reluctance of the Porte or France to support intervention ensured that it would be an exclusively British affair. The entire First Class Army Reserve was called out and forces were despatched from England, the Mediterranean garrisons and India.