Imperialism Archives

Image from an American Friends Service Committee traveling art exhibit called Windows and Mirrors: Reflections on the War in Afghanistan.

Oct. 7, 2001: United States and U.K. Began War in Afghanistan

The United States and United Kingdom began the war in Afghanistan.

Odawa Chief Pontiac Meets with Gladwin | Zinn Education Project

July 31, 1763: Chief Pontiac Wins Battle of Bloody Run at Fort Detroit

Fighting alongside Odawa Chief Pontiac, the unified Native warriors defeated 250 British soldiers during their siege at Fort Detroit during Pontiac’s War.

Poster for an event in Worcester, Massachusetts in 1849, to commemorate the end of slavery in the British West Indies.

Aug. 1, 1834: Britain Passes Slavery Abolition Act

August First Day became a symbol of hope for enslaved people and abolitionists in the United States when Britain passed the Slavery Abolition Act in 1834, abolishing slavery throughout its colonies around the world.

Gangsters of Capitalism: Smedley Butler, the Marines, and the Making and Breaking of America’s Empire

Book — Non-fiction. By Jonathan M. Katz. 2022. 432 pages.
This book traces a path from the first wave of U.S. overseas expansionism to the rise of fascism in the 1930s to the crises of democracy in our own time.

Teaching Activity by Jonathan M. Katz

Standing with Standing Rock: Voices from the #NoDAPL Movement

Book — Non-fiction. Edited by Nick Estes and Jaskiran Dhillon. 2019. 448 pages.
Through poetry and prose, essays, photography, interviews, and polemical interventions, the contributors, including leaders of the Standing Rock movement, reflect on Indigenous history and politics and on the movement's significance.

Teaching Activity by Nick Estes (editor)

Takeover: How We Occupied a Hospital and Changed Public Health Care

Film. By Emma Francis-Snyder. 2021. 38 minutes.
Takeover tells the story of the Young Lords’ 12-hour occupation of Lincoln Hospital in the South Bronx in 1970.

Bad Mexicans: Race, Empire, and Revolution in the Borderlands

Book — Non-fiction. By Kelly Lytle Hernández. 2022. 384 pages.
Taking readers to the frontlines of the magonista uprising and the counterinsurgency campaign that failed to stop them, Kelly Lytle Hernández puts the magonista revolt at the heart of U.S. history.

June 10, 2018: Ancestral Land Returned to Ponca Tribe

Along the “Trail of Tears” in Neligh, Nebraska, a farmer signed a deed to return ancestral land to the Ponca Tribe.

The People Shall Continue

Picture Book. By Simon J. Ortiz, illustrated by Sharol Graves. 2022. 32 pages.
This powerful telling of the history of the Native/Indigenous peoples of North America recounts their story from Creation to the invasion and usurpation of Native lands.

Teaching Activity by By Simon J. Ortiz, Illustrated by Sharol Graves

Arise!: Global Radicalism in the Era of the Mexican Revolution

Book — Non-fiction. By Christina Heatherton. 2022. 336 pages.
This book tells the international history of radical movements and their convergences during the Mexican Revolution, reconstructing how this era's organizers found new ways to fight global capitalism.

Born in Blackness: Africa, Africans, and the Making of the Modern World, 1471 to the Second World War

Book — Non-fiction. By Howard W. French. 2021. 521 pages.
This sweeping history reveals a long-concealed history of trivialization and, more often, elision in depictions of African history throughout the last five hundred years.

book cover showing sketch of woman's face with a sketch of a butterfly overlapping her.

In the Time of the Butterflies

Book — Fiction. By Julia Alvarez. 2010. 352 pages.
The story of Las Mariposas — “The Butterflies” — is about four sisters and their tragic deaths under Trujillo’s dictatorship in the Dominican Republic.

The Mirabal Sisters from left, Minerva, Maria Teresa and Patria.

Nov. 25, 1960: Mirabal Sisters Murdered in Dominican Republic

The murder of the Mirabal sisters — who clandestinely opposed the dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo in the Dominican Republic and were then brutally killed — has become an international symbol of resistance to violence against women.

The Counter Revolution of 1836: Texas Slavery & Jim Crow and the Roots of American Fascism

Book — Non-fiction. By Gerald Horne. 2022. 632 pages.
A detailed history of counterrevolutionary forces in Texas state history.

A Plaque in Jamaica commemorating Tacky's Rebellion

April 7, 1760: Tacky’s Rebellion Began

Inspired by the First Maroon War, a group of enslaved Ghanaian rebels in Jamaica sought to overthrow the British colonialists and create an independent Black nation on the island.

late April 1821: U.S. Attack on Maroon Community at Angola

After becoming governor of Florida in 1821, Andrew Jackson attacked the native and Black maroon community at Angola.

Indigenous delegate David Close meets with Pope Francis during the Long March to Rome and Delegation Lead to the Mission in Rome.

May 4, 2016: Indigenous People March to Demand Revocation of the Doctrine of Discovery

A delegation representing Native nations marched upon the Vatican and were successful in convincing the Vatican to revoke the Doctrine of Discovery.

July 18, 1890: George Washington Williams Pens Letter Exposing Atrocities in the Congo

Hoping to spark a movement in protest of the Belgian government’s role in its African colony, historian George Washington Williams wrote an open letter to Belgian King Leopold II exposing atrocities in the Congo.

Feb. 12, 1904: Report on Brutal Violence of Imperialism in the Congo

The Casement Report was delivered before the British Houses of Parliament, providing firsthand accounts of the brutal violence inflicted upon the indigenous people and the land in the Congo Free State by settler colonialists acting on behalf of Belgium’s King Leopold II.

a scene depicting the battle between the enslaved and their overseers during the Demerara Uprising in Guyana

Aug. 18, 1823: The Demerara Uprising

This was the largest uprising of the enslaved against their British overseers in Guyana. The uprising was ended after a few days, though it served as a catalyst for the abolition of slavery in British colonies soon thereafter.

A sepia photograph of seven members of the Gainesville 8 and their attorneys.

Aug. 31, 1973: Gainesville 8 Acquitted

Members of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) were arrested and erroneously charged with inciting violence at the 1972 Republican National Convention in Miami. They were all later acquitted after a lengthy and much publicized trial.

The battlefield of Verdun is part of France's Zone Rouge, cordoned off since the end of WWI.

July 28, 1914: World War I Begins

The First World War killed roughly 20 million people. Fighting transitioned from mainly human- and animal-powered to fossil fuel-powered technologies and accessing and protecting fossil fuel supplies became part of sustaining a powerful military. The Earth and the environment have suffered ever since.

The Overthrow of Democracy in Chile — A Timeline

Article. Timeline by Bill Bigelow. 2023.
A timeline of the overthrow of democracy in Chile — the fall of Salvador Allende and the rise of Augusto Pinochet.

Oct. 12, 1925: U.S. Fights Panama Renters’ Strike

Protesting rising rents and unsanitary conditions, tenants in Panama City, Panama were met with swift force and violence by U.S. soldiers, with six killed during the weekend.

War Made Invisible: How America Hides the Human Toll of Its Military Machine

Book — Non-fiction. By Norman Solomon. 2023. 240 pages.
Too often, our curriculum “makes war invisible.” Too often, the ravages of U.S. militarism go unexamined in our classes. This fact-filled book insists: Teach about this; people’s lives depend on it.

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