Analysis Of Abina And The Diaries Of William Stairs

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Recommended: Expansionism in the mid 19th century

Until recently, world history has been a history of empires. From the Mongols to the Ottomans, empires have always sought to push their physical boundaries, yet none have achieved the success of the British. With colonies in the Americas, Africa, and Australia, 19th century Britons were able to claim that the sun never set on their empire. This far-reaching and wide-encompassing empire allowed the British to establish a global movement of people, goods, ideas, and capital. This global movement not only asserted Britain’s financial dominance, but it also enabled the British to project their western ideology on to the rest of the world. However, the British visions of empire did not always match up with reality. Although there was a British presence across a large part of the globe, the diversity of people and their treatment created sharp distinctions among …show more content…

Abina was a courageous and bold young woman from West Africa who was enslaved against her will, even though the practice had been outlawed many years before. After escaping to British-controlled territory, she took her case to local court and placed her hope in the colonial British judicial system. Instead of being allowed to present her case to a jury of her peers, she was forced to look for sympathy from “important men,” or the white men with political power. The story exposes the fact that, for imperialists, labor was the scarcest resource. Because of this, the British employed forced labor, claiming that the Africans were working to pay off their taxes. While the brutal and sometimes violent extraction of labor is an ugly part of imperial efforts in Africa, the greatest tragedy is the political divisions that were imposed by Western powers, and the fact that they do not leave when British rule

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