Last year, in Imperial Reckoning Part 1, we examined Britain's colonial legacy in Nova Scotia, Sierra Leone, South Asia, Malaya and Kenya. In this year's course, we will consider the colonial legacy in Canada, New Zealand and Australia (the European settler colonies), in the Caribbean (especially in Jamaica), in Southern Africa (comparing and contrasting the former North and South Rhodesia/Zimbabwe and Botswana, and in the Middle East (especially in Iraq and the Gulf States). Colonization and decolonization took many forms and unfolded over more than 400 years. We will consider the positive and negative impacts of the colonial system across these widely dispersed and varied nations.

Background resources for the course will be posted on Padlet to enable participants to dig more deeply into the historical record. Individuals interested in Imperial Reckoning Part 1 can purchase one or more of the six videos through the OLLI office.

OLLI members with a particular interest in the Middle East may also wish to take Richard Matturro’s course on Lawrence of Arabia.

Katherine Kidd studied at Pacific Lutheran University (BA in History and German), Harvard (AM in Soviet Studies) and the University of Pennsylvania (PhD in International Relations). She developed and directed majors in International Studies at Fairfield and Sacred Heart Universities. Her academic and non-profit work has taken her to several countries in Latin America, to Hong Kong and Saudi Arabia, to Russia and Eastern Europe, and to Kenya and Tanzania in East Africa. She has taught regularly for OLLI at BCC since 2017.