One clear sign of how ignorant and immature the college protesters are is how they all don't seem to want to be held accountable for the crimes they committed.
I wish that our U.S. campuses would at least still assign students to read MLK's Letter from a Birmingham jail, and Thoreau's essay on Civil Disobedience.
I think these protesters have failed the guidelines of: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self-purification; and effective direct action.
Where will all the microbats go when the NSW forests are logged and clear-felled?
Decline of rare UK bat linked to tree felling for British empire’s fleets
"Rife deforestation 500 years ago aligns with western barbastelle slump, finds study of bat DNA."
"The examples of flora and fauna disappearing because of human excesses over the past 50 years are manifold, but research has found that the decline of a characterful bat began in the UK when its trees were felled for shipbuilding 500 years ago."
"“These bats usually roost in mature oak and beech trees, and move around every few nights – so they benefit from areas with substantial woodland cover. Our findings reveal that the northern and southern British populations have declined over several centuries, beginning about 500 years ago. This coincides with a period of widespread tree-felling to supply wood for colonial shipbuilding. It is likely that the decline we found was triggered by this loss of woodland – which has continued since that period.” https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/dec/14/decline-of-rare-uk-bat-linked-to-tree-felling-for-british-empires-fleets
"Yet, for all that, Hong Kong flourished... under the aegis of empire. ... Though denied full democratic rights, its people eventually prospered."
Simon Tisdall in the Guardian decrying China's destruction of Hong Kong's democracy by, er... harking back to the British Empire's undemocratic treatment of Hong Kong. China's treatment of Hong Kong is a disgrace, but I'm not sure this is the killer argument Tisdall seems to think.
OK #BritishEmpire#histodons: I’m teaching a “English Civilization 1603–present” survey course next year, and I want to do it through the lens of Greater Britain. I’m not crazy about the start date, though; it wasn’t my choice. (I’d start in the 18C if it were up to me.)
Any suggestions for textbooks?
This will be a lower-division course with lots of first-year university students, mostly not history majors.
Condemned: The Transported Men, Women and Children Who Built Britain's Empire by Graham Seal
In the early seventeenth century, Britain took ruthless steps to deal with its unwanted citizens, forcibly removing men, women, and children from their homelands and sending them to far-flung corners of the empire to be sold off to colonial masters. This oppressive regime grew into a brutal system of human bondage which would continue into the twentieth century.
ever heard that factoid about empires lasting 250 years? Sometimes it's claimed that this is an average, one person even claimed that it was an upper limit.
This is probably false. The claim originates with a fellow named Glubb. Dude was born in the 19th century and served as an agent of British military control of the Middle East. He wrote a short book/long essay called "The Fate of Empires and the Search for Survival" in which he made that claim. He was not trained as a historian, offered no citations, and excluded American and African empires. (He did say it was an average, though.)
Anyway I thought I'd mention it since I brought it up during a conversation with @poiseunderchaos and they were like, "yeah I'm not so sure about that."
Niall Ferguson's acclaimed bestseller on the highs and lows of Britain's empire. 'A remarkably readable précis of the whole British imperial story - triumphs, deceits, decencies, kindnesses, cruelties and all' - Jan Morris
Legacy of Violence: A History of the British Empire
From Pulitzer Prize–winning historian: a searing study of the British Empire that probes the country's pervasive use of violence throughout the twentieth century and traces how these practices were exported, modified, and institutionalized in colonies around the globe.
It does not accurately describe either the foundation of #Israel or the tragedy of the #Palestinians.
By Simon Sebag Montefiore
“…Whatever the enormous complexities…, one truth should be obvious among decent people: killing 1,400 people & kidnapping >200, including scores of #civilians, was deeply wrong.
“If the ideology of #decolonization, taught in our universities as a theory of history & shouted in our streets…, badly misconstrues present reality, does it reflect the history of #Israel as it claims to do? …Indeed, it does not accurately describe either the foundation of Israel or the tragedy of the #Palestinians.
“Acc/to the decolonizers, Israel is & always has been an illegitimate state because it was fostered by the #BritishEmpire & because some of its founders were European-born Jews.
The José Medeiros Ferreira Lecture, which marks the beginning of the academic year of the PhD in History at the NOVA School of Social Sciences and Humanities, is organised by the IHC and will have as its guest speaker our Visiting Scholar, Sue Onslow, from King's College London.
On the morning of 29 September, Sue Onslow, IHC’s 2023 Visiting Scholar, will presente a seminnar on her experience as an #OralHistory practitioner, namely interviewing actors in the Zimbabwe independence process.
"As a member of the African diaspora, the festival’s curation feels personal to me – as if it was designed for me. Yet I wonder how other members of the Global Majority will experience it, and I wonder how white people will experience it."