Canada and the British Empire

Canada and the British Empire
Author: Phillip Alfred Buckner
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Total Pages: 312
Release: 2008
Genre: History
ISBN: 019927164X

Canada and the British Empire traces the evolution of Canada, placing it within the wider context of British imperial history. Beginning with a broad chronological narrative, the volume surveys the country's history from the foundation of the first British bases in Canada in the early seventeenth century, until the patriation of the Canadian constitution in 1982. Historians approach the subject thematically, analysing subjects such as British migration to Canada, the role played by gender in the construction of imperial identities, and the economic relationship between Canada and Britain. Other important chapters examine the history of Newfoundland, the history and legacy of imperial law, and the attitudes of French Canadians and Canada's aboriginal peoples to the imperial relationship. The overall focus of the book is on emphasising the part that Canada played in the British Empire, and on understanding the Canadian response towards imperialism. With contributions from leading scholars in the field, it is essential reading for anyone interested either in the history of Canada or in the history of the British Empire.

Canada and the End of Empire

Canada and the End of Empire
Author: Phillip Buckner
Publisher: UBC Press
Total Pages: 337
Release: 2007-10-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 0774850663

Sir John Seeley once wrote that the British Empire was acquired in “a fit of absence of mind.” Whatever the truth of this comment, it is certainly arguable that the Empire was dismantled in such a fit. This collection deals with a neglected subject in post-Confederation Canadian history – the implications to Canada and Canadians of British decolonization and the end of empire. Canada and the End of Empire looks at Canadian diplomatic relations with the United Kingdom and the United States, the Suez crisis, the changing economic relationship with Great Britain in the 1950s and 1960s, the role of educational and cultural institutions in maintaining the British connection, the royal tour of 1959, the decision to adopt a new flag in 1964, the efforts to find a formula for repatriating the constitution, the Canadianization of the Royal Canadian Navy, and the attitude of First Nations to the changed nature of the Anglo-Canadian relationship. Historians in Commonwealth countries tend to view the end of British rule from a nationalist perspective. Canada and the End of Empire challenges this view and demonstrates the centrality of imperial history in Canadian historiography. An important addition to the growing canon of empire studies and imperial history, this book will be of interest to historians of the Commonwealth, and to scholars and students interested in the relationship between colonialism and nationalism.

Canada's Great War, 1914-1918

Canada's Great War, 1914-1918
Author: Brian Douglas Tennyson
Publisher: Scarecrow Press
Total Pages: 261
Release: 2014-11-25
Genre: History
ISBN: 0810888602

Canada’s Great War, 1914-1918: How Canada Helped Save the British Empire and Became a North American Nation describes the major role that Canada played in helping the British Empire win the greatest war in history—and, somewhat surprisingly, resulted in Canada’s closer integration not with the British Empire but with its continental neighbor, the United States. When Britain declared war against Germany and Austria-Hungary in August 1914, Canada was automatically committed as well because of its status as a Dominion in the British Empire. Despite not having a say in the matter, most Canadians enthusiastically embraced the war effort in order to defend the Empire and its values. In Canada’s Great War, 1914-1918, historian Brian Douglas Tennyson argues that Canada’s participation in the war weakened its relationship with Britain by stimulating a greater sense of Canadian identity, while at the same time bringing it much closer to the United States, especially after the latter entered the war. Their wartime cooperation strengthened their relationship, which had been delicate and often strained in the nineteenth century. This was reflected in the greater integration of their economies and the greater acceptance in Canada of American cultural products such as books, magazines, radio broadcasting and movies, and was symbolized by the astonishing American response to the Halifax explosion in December 1917. By the end of the war, Canadians were emerging as a North American people, no longer fearing close ties to the United States, even as they maintained their ties to the British Commonwealth. Canada’s Great War, 1914-1918 will interest not only Canadians unaware of how greatly their nation’s participation in the First World War reshaped its relationship with Britain and the United States, but also Americans unacquainted with the magnitude of Canada’s involvement in the war and how that contribution drew the two nations closer together.

Canada and the British World

Canada and the British World
Author: Phillip Alfred Buckner
Publisher: University of British Columbia Press
Total Pages: 418
Release: 2006
Genre: Canada
ISBN:

In the aftermath of the Second World War, Canadian national identity underwent a transformation. Whereas Canadians once viewed themselves as British citizens, a new, independent sense of self emerged after the war. Assured of their unique place in the world, Canadians began to reflect on the legacies and lessons of their British colonial past. Canada and the British World surveys Canada's national history through a British lens. In a series of essays focusing on discrete aspects of Canadian identity over more than a century, the complex and evolving relationship between Canada and the larger British world is revealed. From the 19th century's staunch belief in Canadians as Britons to the realities of modern multicultural Canada, this book eschews nostalgia in its endeavor to understand the dynamic and complicated society in which Canadians did and do live. Candid and ambitious, Canada and the British World is recommended reading for historians and scholars of colonialism and nationalism, as well as anyone interested in what it really means to be Canadian.

The Last Thousand Days of the British Empire

The Last Thousand Days of the British Empire
Author: Peter Clarke
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 326
Release: 2010-09-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1596917423

A sweeping, brilliantly vivid history of the sudden end of the British empire and the moment when America became a world superpower. "I have not become the King's First Minister in order to preside over the liquidation of the British Empire." Winston Churchill's famous statement in November 1942, just as the tide of the Second World War was beginning to turn, pugnaciously affirmed his loyalty to the world-wide institution that he had served for most of his life. Britain fought and sacrificed on a worldwide scale to defeat Hitler and his allies-and won. Yet less than five years after Churchill's defiant speech, the British Empire effectively ended with Indian Independence in August 1947 and the end of the British Mandate in Palestine in May 1948. As the sun set on Britain's Empire, the age of America as world superpower dawned. How did this rapid change of fortune come about? Peter Clarke's book is the first to analyze the abrupt transition from Rule Britannia to Pax Americana. His swiftly paced narrative makes superb use of letters and diaries to provide vivid portraits of the figures around whom history pivoted: Churchill, Gandhi, Roosevelt, Stalin, Truman, and a host of lesser-known figures though whom Clarke brilliantly shows the human dimension of epochal events. The Last Thousand Days of the British Empire is a captivating work of popular history that shows how the events that followed the war reshaped the world as profoundly as the conflict itself.

Empire and Emancipation

Empire and Emancipation
Author: S. Karly Kehoe
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
Total Pages: 301
Release: 2022-01-28
Genre: History
ISBN: 1487541082

Drawing upon the experiences of Scottish and Irish Catholics in Nova Scotia, Cape Breton Island, Newfoundland, and Trinidad, Empire and Emancipation sheds important new light on the complex relationship between Catholicism and the British Empire.

The British Empire

The British Empire
Author: Stephen W. Sears
Publisher: New Word City
Total Pages: 759
Release: 2014-09-10
Genre: History
ISBN: 1612308090

In 1815, the British controlled the seas. Before the end of the nineteenth century, they ruled Australia, India, New Zealand, half of Africa, half of North America, and islands all around the globe. Theirs was the most powerful empire the world has ever known. Here is the story of how the English acquired their vast domain; how they ruled, maintained, and exploited it; and how, within decades, they presided over its dissolution. Here are Britain's triumphs and also her stinging defeats, her heroes and her scoundrels. It is a full and fascinating chronicle of the growth of the British Empire and its people and of the impact that empire had on the rest of the world.

Surveyors of Empire

Surveyors of Empire
Author: Stephen J. Hornsby
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages: 289
Release: 2011-04-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 0773587349

Using research from both sides of the Atlantic, Stephen Hornsby examines the development of British military cartography in North America during and after the Seven Years War, as well as advancements in military and scientific equipment used in surveying. At the same time, he follows the land speculation of two leading surveyors, Samuel Holland and J.F.W. Des Barres, and the publication history of The Atlantic Neptune. Richly illustrated with images from The Atlantic Neptune and earlier maps, Surveyors of Empire is an insightful account of the relationship between science and imperialism, and the British shaping of the Atlantic world.

Entangling the Quebec Act

Entangling the Quebec Act
Author: Ollivier Hubert
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages:
Release: 2020-12-30
Genre: History
ISBN: 0228004632

Beyond redrawing North American borders and establishing a permanent system of governance, the Quebec Act of 1774 fundamentally changed British notions of empire and authority. Although it is understood as a formative moment - indeed part of the "textbook narrative" - in several different national histories, the Quebec Act remains underexamined in all of them. The first sustained examination of the act in nearly thirty years, Entangling the Quebec Act brings together essays by historians from North America and Europe to explore this seminal event using a variety of historical approaches. Focusing on a singular occurrence that had major social, legal, revolutionary, and imperial repercussions, the book weaves together perspectives from spatially and conceptually distinct historical fields - legal and cultural, political and religious, and beyond. Collectively, the contributors resituate the Quebec Act in light of Atlantic, American, Canadian, Indigenous, and British Imperial historiographies. A transnational collaboration, Entangling the Quebec Act shows how the interconnectedness of national histories is visible at a single crossing point, illustrating the importance of intertwining methodologies to bring these connections into focus.