AP World History: Chapter 32 - The Building of Global Empires

Vocabulary flashcards covering the motives, technological tools, territorial expansion, and anticolonial responses of nineteenth-century global imperialism from Chapter 32.

New Imperialism (c. 1750-1914)

The expansion of industrial powers through direct conquest, settler colonization, and informal economic pressure, driven by resources, markets, national rivalry, and racialized ideologies.

Quinine

A technological and medical tool that reduced malaria mortality for some Europeans in tropical regions during imperial expansion.

Battle of Omdurman (1898)

A military engagement that vividly demonstrated the extreme firepower imbalance between imperial armies with modern firearms and indigenous forces.

Direct Rule

An administrative system where colonial officials directly replaced local authorities to govern a colony.

Indirect Rule

A colonial governance strategy that ruled through selected existing local elites, often altering local power structures.

Settler Colonies

Territories characterized by significant European immigrant settlement that often resulted in severe dispossession of Indigenous populations.

Sepoys

Indian soldiers who helped the British East India Company expand its control across India as the Mughal Empire weakened.

Indian Rebellion of 1857

An armed uprising that helped bring an end to British East India Company rule, leading the British crown to assume direct authority in 1858 under a viceroy.

The Great Game

The geopolitical competition between Britain and Russia for influence in Central and Southeast Asia, particularly centered around Afghanistan.

Siam

A Southeast Asian kingdom that managed to retain its independence partly by serving as a strategic buffer between European imperial possessions.

Congo Free State

A central African colony established under Leopold II that brutally imposed forced labor on the local population.

Berlin Conference (1884-85)

A meeting where European powers established rules for territorial claims and effective occupation of Africa, conducted without African representation.

Afrikaners

Dutch-descended settlers in South Africa who clashed with the British, particularly as competition over gold and diamonds intensified.

Second Boer War (1899-1902)

A conflict in South Africa between the British and Afrikaners sparked by tensions over gold and diamond discoveries, ending in a British victory.

Monroe Doctrine (1823)

A United States policy declaration that warned European powers against further colonization in the Americas.

Spanish-American War (1898)

A conflict that gave the United States control of Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines, while placing a formally independent Cuba under heavy U.S. influence.

Maji Maji Uprising (1905-07)

An armed resistance movement against foreign European colonial rule in Africa.

Indian National Congress (1885)

A political organization founded in India that represented organized political nationalism and pushed back against British imperial rule.

All-India Muslim League (1906)

An organized political nationalism body founded to represent Muslim interests and organize against colonial policies in British India.

Indentured Laborers

Migrant laborers, primarily from India and China, who moved to plantations and work sites across the Caribbean, Africa, and the Pacific following shifts in global labor demands.