Review
'This is a fine collection, which patiently unthreads one of the most persistent orthodoxies of British historiography - the belief that decolonisation was a process which happened only "overseas".' --Bill Schwarz, Goldsmiths' College, University of London


Book Description
The demise of the British Empire in the three decades following the Second World War is a theme that has been well traversed in studies of post-war British politics, economics and foreign relations. Yet there has been strikingly little attention to the question of how these dramatic changes in Britain's relationships with the wider world were reflected in British culture. This volume addresses this central issue, arguing that the social and cultural impact of decolonisation had as significant an effect on the imperial centre as on the colonial periphery. Far from being a matter of indifference or resigned acceptance as is often suggested, the fall of the British Empire came as a profound shock to the British national imagination, and resonated widely in British popular culture.


About the Author
Stuart Ward is Lecturer in History at the Menzies Center for Australian Studies, King's College, University of London.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Opening up an entirely new field of enquiry in the history of decolonization, the essays in this volume reflect on the fall of the British Empire, and its resonance in British popular culture. The demise of the Empire during the three decades following WWII transformed Britain's relationships with the wider world, and within Britain itself. The contributors argue that the social and cultural impact of decolinization had as significant of an effect on the imperial center as on the colonial periphery.