The British Empire: Criticism from Within

Ever since the first expansionist attempts in the 16th century, Britain enlarged its territory so that by the Victorian era, in the 19th century, it was called "the Empire where the sun never sets." By 1919, right after the end of the First World War, the British Empire reached its highest extent.

Then, the collapse of the Empire began. In the "white colonies", this was a peaceful, easy process. In the "non-white colonies", though, it took decades of both violence and peaceful protest to achieve independence.

One of the colonies where there was a strong anti-colonialist feeling was Burma, in Asia. George Orwell, who had been born in India, where his father was in the civil service, joined the Imperial Police in Burma from 1922 to 1927.

His own experience taught him to be an anticolonialist. One of those experiences, together with his view on colonialims and inhabitants of the colonies is clearly depicted in the narrative essay "Shooting an Elephant".

The text raises questions on issues such as the following:
* Colonial history
* The language of the colonizer vs. The language of the colonized
* Voices / once voiceless
* Different perspectives
* Power / language
* The “Other”

As we read this essay and some of the texts assigned for the following weeks, we are going to discuss how they reflect these ideas.