Empire? what empire? imperialism and British national identity c. 1815-1914

Abstract

[Introduction]:One of Britain's obvious distinguishing characteristics in the 19th century, and for fifty or so years on either side, was her empire. Britain of course is by no means alone in having been a colonial power at one time or another. Hers however was the largest overseas empire in history, by most ways of measuring it, and also the last significant empire that admitted to the name. For most foreigners, who were generally at the receiving end of this - it was as an empire that Britain most affected them - it was her imperial status more than anything else that determined her national identity. In recent years many Britons too have come to define her in terms of her empire retrospectively. They include cultural 'theorists' who have teased imperial subtexts from the most unlikely cultural products of 19th century Britain (Jane Austen's Mansfield Park is the most famous example), in order to show how seeped in empire the country was. This is understandable. It is difficult to imagine that so huge an enterprise could not have had a profound effect on Britons' views of themselves and of their nation (or nations)while it was still going on. It may also however be misleading. If we put aside the expectation of imperialism, we find that the empire did not need to have been anything like as pervasive as this - as essential to Britons' self-perception as a nation - as might be thought. This is for three broad reasons. The first is that the empire did not materially effect Britons sufficiently to make such a cultural impact inescapable. The second is that the empirical evidence on its own does not seem to suggest that it did. Imperial meanings have to be read into the literature; they do not leap out at one. The third is that there are other 'discourses' in British national culture besides the imperial one, some of which are clearly more significant, and are even incompatible with imperialism, properly (that is, usefully) defined.Seen in context, the empire played a very minor part in Britons' sense of national identity; at least until the later years of the 19th century, when the first of these three factors changed.