The empire in one city?

From the late eighteenth century to the early twentieth century, Liverpool was frequently referred to as the ‘second city of the empire’. Yet, the role of Liverpool within the British imperial system and the impact on the city of its colonial connections remain underplayed in recent writing on both Liverpool and the empire. However ‘inconvenient’ this may prove, this specially-commissioned collection of essays demonstrates that the imperial dimension deserves more prevalence in both academic and popular representations of Liverpool’s past.  Indeed, if Liverpool does represent the ‘World in one city’ – the slogan for Liverpool’s status as European Capital of Culture in 2008 – it could be argued that this is largely down to Merseyside’s long-term interactions with the colonial world, and the legacies of that imperial history.  

This book will find a wide audience amongst academics, students and history enthusiasts generally.

Contents:
List of figures
Notes on contributors
Acknowledgements
Introduction: The empire in one city? Sheryllynne Haggerty, Anthony
Webster and Nicholas J. White
1. Liverpool, the slave trade and the British-Atlantic empire, c.1750–75,
Sheryllynne Haggerty
2. Liverpool and the Asian trade, 1800–50: some insights into a
provincial British commercial network, Anthony Webster
3. ‘Stirring spectacles of cosmopolitan animation’: Liverpool as a
diasporic city, 1825–1913, John Herson
4. Liverpool and South America, 1850–1930, Rory M. Miller and Robert
G. Greenhill
5. Collecting empire? African objects, West African trade, and a
Liverpool
Museum, Zachary Kingdon and Dmitri van den Bersselaar
6. Transmitting ideas of empire: representations and celebrations in
Liverpool, 1886–1953, Murray Steele
7. The maligned, the despised and the ostracised: working-class white
women, inter-racial relationships and colonial ideologies in 19th and
20th-century Liverpool, Diane Frost
8. Liverpool shipping and the end of empire: the Ocean group in East
and Southeast Asia, c. 1945–73, Nicholas J. White
9. John Holt & Co. (Liverpool) Ltd. as a contemporary free-standing
company, 1945–2006, Stephanie Decker
Afterword: Liverpool and empire – the revolving door? John MacKenzie
Index