Imperialism

Global Economy

The concept that the whole world is connected economically. What happens in one part of the world affects other parts of the world.

Telegraph

The first long distance communication system consisting of wires on poles transmitting a series of electronic dots and dashes (as sound) known as Morse Code.

Suez Canal

The canal, built by the French and British (with Egyptian labor) between the Mediterranean and Red Seas, shortened the sailing distance from Europe to Asia.

Corporation

A large, multi location, company that offers shares of ownership (called stock) to the general public to raise money. Corporations generally pay their stockholders based on how well they do.

Stock

Shares of ownership in a corporation. Owning these can result in the corporation paying a small amount of revenue back to the holder.

Emigration

The act of leaving a country with the intent to relocate permanently in a different country.

Immigration

The act of entering a country with the intent to stay there permanently.

Migration

The process of large groups of people moving over longer periods of time to new places. For example, the movement of people from farms to cities.

Imperialism

The taking or controlling of foreign land by stronger countries that then dominate the economic, political and social circumstances of the conquered territory.

Colony

The name used to describe areas of imperial control in foreign countries directly run by the technologically superior country. 

Protectorate

The name used to describe foreign countries under the control of the technologically superior country.

Economic Imperialism

The name used to describe foreign countries under the control of a corporation from a technologically superior country.

Zulu

The African tribe that went famously fought the British Empire in South and East Africa. The tribe won a major victory but lost the war and was ultimately destroyed by the technological might of England.

Sphere of Influence

Used to explain the concept where a foreign power’s control over a less advanced country starts small and grows larger in a sphere shape: based on the building of infrastructure (telegraph, rail, port facilities, roads) and increasing influence over an area.

East India Company

The famous English trading company that came to dominate Indian and western Pacific trade between the 1600 and 1900s.

Raj

Both the title of the British administrator in India and the land in India ruled by the British administrator in India.

Extraterritorial Rights

The process of exempting someone from the laws of the country they are in. 

“The Sun Never Sets on the British Empire”

A common phrase in the 19th and 20th centuries reflecting both the power and the scale of the British Empire on earth.

“The Jewel in the Crown”

A phrase/metaphor regarding the importance of India to the economic power of the British Empire.

Sepoy

The name for an Indian soldier (in India) that worked for the British army.

Great Rebellion

The name of the failed rebellion of India against the British Empire (1857). India also calls it the First War of Independence.

Boxer Rebellion

An uprising of violence against foreigners in China that ultimately hurt China’s ability to keep the increasingly angry foreign countries out.

Opium

A drug distilled from the poppy plant that the British East India successfully sold in China to earn huge profits. China’s inability to halt the sale of this drug led to a losing war against Britain and harsh penalties in lost land.