Exploring the British World: Identity, Cultural Production, Institutions

The British World extended very far in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. At its height in the late nineteenth century, it encompassed one-sixth of the world’s landmass. For generations of schoolchildren within its reaches, this space was coded in the pinky hues of school atlases, reinforcing the notion that this was an Empire where the sun never set. Now, in the twenty-first century, those who have been influenced by the British presence are collectively reflecting upon the outcomes of Empire and Commonwealth, the processes of decolonisation and the rise of colonial nationalisms. If Imperial History once looked a confined area of modern world history, the new approaches that scholars are now taking have widened its significance beyond recognition. With a rich array of contributions from emerging and established researchers, Exploring the British World brings together a range of perspectives on the histories, politics, economics, cultures and ongoing legacies of the British Empire primarily, although not exclusively, within the former settler colonies as well as within Britain itself.