Decolonization

Decolonisation

Why teach about Decolonization

It is not a specific objective/standard in the Georgia Standards. There is wiggle room to make time for a

discussion

Teaching it tells the story of resistance and gives agency to colonized people.

Defining Decolonization

The process of imperial governments leaving colonized territories and at which point those territories begin governing themselves.

Opposing Definitions

View 1

a process by which legally dependent territories obtained their constitutional independence and entered the world stage of international relations as sovereign states.

View 2

the reversal of the process of European imperial expansion with all its political, economic, social, cultural and linguistic consequences.

How Decolonization work is organized

Colonized peoples thirst for Independence

World War II making colonial powers look less invulnerable

Focus on anti-colonialism in in international arenas such as the U.N.

Contributing Scholars

Tony Chafer

Martin Shipway

Martin Thomas

Additional Resources

Todd Shepard (2014) Voices of Decolonization

Martin Shipway Decolonization and its impact

Chafer, Tony, The End of Empire in French West Africa: France’s Successful Decolonization?

Nwaubani, Ebere, The United States and Decolonization in West Africa, 1950-1960

Chamberlain, Murial Evelyn, Decolonization: The Fall of the European Empires, Historical Association Studies

Darwin, John, Britain and Decolonization: The Retreat from Empire in the Post-War World