Chap 18 AP World Vocab

Battle of Isandlwana

More than 20,000 Zulu soldiers outmaneuvered a much smaller but overconfident British army invading their kingdom by taking advantage of the British commander’s foolhardy decision to divide his forces in which the Zulus attacked the main British encampment form all directions.

impis

Equivalent of a division in a Western army

assegais

short stabbing spears (Zulu’s trademark for more than half a century) along with cattle hide shields

Shaka

ambitious young leader who forged a powerful kingdom centered on Natal in the southeastern portions of what would later become the Union of South Africa

Why was the British defeat shocking?

Because it seemed implausible, given the great and ever-growing disparity between the military might of the European colonial powers and the African and Asian peoples they had come to dominate in unprecendented ways.

Zulus

African tribe with imposing preindustrial military organization that triumphed over all African rivals and later proved the most formidable force resisting the advance of both the Dutch descended Boers (later called Afrikaners) and British imperial armies in Southern Africa.

Mataram

Kingdom that controlled interior regions of Java in 17th century; Dutch East India Company paid tribute to the kingdom for rights of trade at batavia; weakness of kingdom after 1670s allowed Dutch to exert control over all of Java.

Sepoys

Troops that served the British East India Company; recruited mainly from various warlike peoples of India (Brtish relied on them heavily, as a prize colony as well)

British Raj

British political establishment in India; developed as a result of rivalry between France and Britain in India.

Plassey

Battle in 1757 between small troops of the British East India Company and an Indian army under Sirájud-daula, ruler of Bengal; British victory marked the rise of British control over Northern India.

Prize: control of fertile and populous kingdom of Bengal

Robert Clive

(1725-1774) Architect of British victory at Plassey in 1757; established foundations of British Raj in Northern India (18th century); paid spies to give him detailed accounts of divisions in Siráj’s rank in the months before the battle

nawab

ruler of Bengal like Siráj ud-daula

Presidencies

3 districts that made up the bulk of the directly ruled British territories in India; capitals at Madras, Calcutta and Bombay.

Princely States

Domains of Indian princes allied with the British Raj; agents of East India Company were stationed at the ruler’s courts to ensure compliance; made up over 1/3 of the British Indian empire.

Bungalow

Similar European dwellings usually smaller which came into fashion in India in the 18th cenutry

hookahs

Indian water pipes

nabobs

Name given to British representatives (english novelists) of the East India Company who went briefly to India to make fortunes through graft and exploitation

Lord Charles Cornwallis

(1738-1805) Reformer of the East India Company administration of India in the 1790s; reduced power of local British administrators; checked widespread corruption; same person who surrendered at Yorktown; mistrusted Indians so limited their participation in governing the empire

madrasas

Islamic religious schools or Hindu gurus instructing individuals or small groups of students

Thomas Babington Macaulay

Declared in 1830s that one shelf of an English gentleman’s library was worth all the writings of Asia

sati

The Hindu practice of burning a widow on the funeral pyre of her deceased husband

Ram Mohan Roy

(1772-1833) Western-educated Indian leader, early 19th century; cooperated with British to outlaw sati

Great Indian Mutiny

Rebellion from ranks of British-trained Indian soldiers, viewed as a war of independence.

Isandlwana

Location of battle fought in 1879 between the British and Zulu armies in South Africa; resulted in defeat of British; one of few victories of African forces over Western Europeans.

tropical dependencies

Colonies with substantial indigenous populations that were ruled by small European political and military minorities with the assistance of colonized bureaucrats, soldiers, clerks, and servants

settlement colonies

Aeras, such as North America and Australia, that were both conquered by European invaders and settled by large numbers of European migrants who made the colonized areas their permanent home and dispersed and decimated the indigenous inhabitants.

White Dominions

Colonies in which European settlers made up the overwhelming majority of the population; small numbers of native inhabitants were typically reduced by disease and wars of conquest; typical of British holdings in North America and Australia with growing independence int he 19th cenutry

Prestor John

An adventure story written by John Buchan and a favorite in the pre-World War I decades among Enlgish schoolboys; Dvie, the protagonist summarizes key elements of the “civilizing mission“ credo which so many European thinkers and political leaders use to justify their colonization (their task and responsibilty to “colonize“ and that Africans are greedy)

Batouala

René Maran’s book published after WW1. Maran was an African American born in Martinique who was highly sensitive to the plight of the colonized in Africa. His protagonist, a local leader named Batouala complains of the burdens rather than the benefits of colonial rule.

white racial supremacy

Belief in the inherent mental, moral and cultural superiority of whites; peaked in acceptance in decades before WW1; supported by social science doctrines of Social Darwinists such as Herbert Spencer

Natal

British colony in South Africa; developed after Boer trek north from Cape Colony; major commercial outpost at Durban

Boer Republics

Transvaal and Orange Free State in Southern Africa; established to assert independence of Boers from British colonial government in Cape Colony in 1850s; discovery of diamonds and precious metals caused British migration into the Boer areas in 1860s.

Gecil Rhodes

(1853-1902) British entrepreneur in South Africa around 1900; manipulated political situation in South Africa to gain entry to resources of Boer Republics; encouraged Boer War as means of destroyed Boer independence.

Anglo-Boer War

Fought between 1899 and 1902 over the continued independence of Boer Republics; resulted in British victory, but began the process of decolonization for whites in South Africa

Captain James Cook

(1728-1779) Made voyages to Hawaii from 1777 to 1779 resulting in opening of islands to the West; convinced Kamehameha to establish unified kingdom in the islands; killed in Hawaii after misunderstandings

Kamehameha

Young Hawaiian prince convinced that imitation of Western ways could produce a unified kingdom under his leadership replacing the small and warring regional units previously prevailed. Promoted economic change, encouraging Western merchants to establish export trade in Hawaiian goods in return for increasing revenues to the royal treasury

Keopuolani and Liliuukalani

2 formidable queens who advanced the process of change by insisting that traditional taboos subordinating women be abandoned.

muumuu

New garment made from homespun American nightgowns with sleeves cut off due to missionaries railing against traditional Hawaiian costume