Do you want to stay informed about this journal? Click the buttons to subscribe to our alerts.
Visual Symbols and Military Culture in Britain’s West African Colonial Army (c.1900–60)
In: International Journal of Military History and HistoriographyAbstract
Visual symbols like uniforms, emblems and ceremonies became central in inventing British military culture among West African forces reflecting orientalist and ornamentalist interpretations of empire. While uniforms fostered military identity, the versions devised for West African soldiers reproduced racial stereotypes and military fashion trends. Granting insignia and Colours to West African units transformed them from simplistic paramilitaries to honoured members of the British imperial milieu. Colours served as ritual objects enabling West African forces to recreate pivotal cultural events of the British regimental system. The public presence of uniformed West African soldiers promoted a sense of imperial majesty that reinforced British rule. Travelling to Britain, West African troops participated in parades and exhibitions initially displaying the epic scale of the empire, but eventually these military visitors became symbols of colonial reform. With independence, Britain’s former colonies in West Africa retained Western-style military symbols altered to highlight republicanism and modernist aspirations.
Purchase
Buy instant access (PDF download and unlimited online access):
Institutional Login
Log in with Open Athens, Shibboleth, or your institutional credentials
Personal login
Log in with your brill.com account
-
Adler, Thomas S. Hinterland Warriors and Military Dress: European Empire and Exotic Uniforms (New York: Berg, 1999).
-
Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origins and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 1983).
-
Barkawi, Tarak. Soldiers of Empire: Indian and British Armies in World War ii (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017).
-
Bennett, Melissa, “‘Exhibits with Real Colour and Interest’: Representations of the West Indian Regiment at Atlantic World’s Fairs.” Slavery and Abolition: A Journal of Slave and Post-Slave Studies 39 (3) (2018), 558–578.
-
Cannadine, David. Ornamentalism: How the British Saw Their Empire (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001).
-
Carswell, Allan. “Scottish Military Dress.” In A Military History of Scotland, eds. Edward M. Spiers, Jeremy Crang, Matthew Strickland (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2012), 627–647.
-
Cole, Festus. “Defining the ‘Flesh’ of the Black Soldier in Colonial Sierra Leone: Background to the Gunners’ Mutiny of 1939.” Canadian Journal of African Studies 48 (2) (2014), 275–295.
-
Deringil, Selim. “The Invention of Tradition as Public Image in the Late Ottoman Empire, 1808–1908.” Comparative Studies in Society and History 35 (1) (1993), 3–29.
-
Echenberg, Myron. Colonial Conscripts: The Tirailleurs Sénégalais in French West Africa, 1857–1960 (Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1991).
-
English, Allen D. Understanding Military Culture: A Canadian Perspective (Montreal, Canada: McGill-Queens, 2004).
-
Engmann, Rachel Ama Asaa. “Under Imperial Eyes, Black Bodies, Buttocks, and Breasts: British Colonial Photography and Asante ‘Fetish Girls’.” African Arts 45 (2) (2012), 46–57.
-
French, David, Military Identities: The Regimental System, the British Army and the British People, c.1870–2000 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005).
-
Glover, Lady. Life of Sir John Hawley Glover (London: Smith, Elder and Co., 1897).
-
Gore, Albert. A Contribution to the Medical History of our West African Campaigns (London: Bailliere, Tindall and Cox, 1876).
-
Grant, Philip. “Belo Akure – A Nigerian First World War Hero at Wembley”. Wembley History Society, July 2017, https://www.brent.gov.uk/media/16408715/belo-akure-a-nigerian-first-world-war-hero-at-wembley.pdf, accessed 17 June 2020.
-
Green, Jeffrey. Black Edwardians: Black People in Britain, 1901–1914 (London: Frank Cass, 1998).
-
Haywood, A., and F. A. S. Clarke. The History of the Royal West African Frontier Force (Aldershot: Gale and Polden, 1964).
-
Hobsbawm, Eric, and Terrance Ranger, eds. The Invention of Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983).
-
Hull, Isobel. Absolute Destruction: Military Culture and the Practices of War in Imperial Germany (Ithaca, NY: Cornel University Press, 2013).
-
Keegan, John. World Armies (London: MacMillan, 1983).
-
Killingray, David. Fighting for Britain: African Soldiers in the Second World War (Woodbridge: James Currey, 2010).
-
Killingray, David. “The Mutiny of the West African Regiment in the Gold Coast, 1901.” International Journal of African Historical Studies 16 (3) (1983), 441–454.
-
Killingray, David, and Andrew Roberts. “An Outline History of Photography in Africa.” History in Africa 16 (1989), 197–208.
-
MacKenzie, John. Propaganda and Empire: The Manipulation of British Public Opinion, 1880–1960 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1984).
-
Martin, Phyllis. Leisure and Society in Colonial Brazzaville (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995).
-
Mathews, James K. “World War i and the Rise of African Nationalism: Nigerian Veterans as Catalysts for Change.” The Journal of Modern African Studies 20 (3) (1982), 493–502.
-
Miners, N. J. The Nigerian Army, 1956–1966 (London: Methuen, 1971).
-
Mitcham, John. Race and Imperial Defence in the British World, 1870–1914 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016).
-
Moyse-Bartlett, Hubert. The King’s African Rifles: A Study in the Military History of East and Central Africa, 1890–1945 (Aldershot: Gale and Polden, 1956).
-
Myerly, Scott Hughes. British Military Spectacle: From the Napoleonic Wars through the Crimea (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).
-
Parsons, Timothy H. The African Rank-and-File: Social Implications of Colonial Military Service in the King’s African Rifles, 1902–1964 (Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1999).
-
Richards, Jeffrey, Imperialism and Music: Britain, 1876–1953 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001).
-
Roy, Kaushik. “The Construction of Regiments in the Indian Army: 1859–1913.” War in History 8 (2) (2001), 127–148.
-
Roche, Daniel. The Culture of Clothing: Dress and Fashion in the ‘Ancien Regime’ (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994).
-
Said, Edward. Orientalism (New York: Pantheon, 1978).
-
Scanlan, Padraic X. Freedom’s Debtors: British Antislavery in Sierra Leone in the Age of Revolution (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2017).
-
Siblon, John. “Negotiating Hierarchy and Memory: African and Caribbean Troops from Former British Colonies in London’s Imperial Spaces.” The London Journal 41 (3) (2016), 299–312.
-
Smith, Richard, Jamaican Volunteers in the First World War: Race, Masculinity and the Development of National Consciousness (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2004).
-
Smith, Richard. “Loss and Longing: Emotional Responses to West Indian Soldiers during the First World War.” In The British Empire and the First World War, ed. Ashley Jackson (New York: Routledge, 2016), 419–428.
-
Stapleton, Timothy. African Police and Soldiers in Colonial Zimbabwe, 1923–1980 (Rochester, NY: Rochester University Press, 2011).
-
Stapleton, Timothy. “Martial Identities in Colonial Nigeria, (1900–1960).” Journal of African Military History 3 (1) (2019), 1–32.
-
Stephen, Daniel. The Empire of Progress: West Africans, Indians and Britons at the British Empire Exhibition, 1924–25 (Basingstoke: Palgrave MacMillan 2013).
-
Tomforde, Maren. “‘My Pink Uniform Shows I am one of Them’: Socio-Cultural Dimensions of German Peace-Keeping Missions”. In Armed Forces, Soldiers and Civil-Military Relations: Essays in Honour of Jurgen Kuhlmann, eds. Gerhard Kümmel, Giuseppe Caforio, and Christopher Dandeker (Wiesbaden: VS Verlag, 2009), 37–57.
-
Turay, E. D. A., and A. Abraham. The Sierra Leone Army: A Century of Tradition (London: MacMillan, 1987).
-
Tynan, Jane. “A Visual and Material Culture Approach to Research War and Conflict”, in The Routledge Companion to Military Research Methods, eds. Williams Alison, K. Neil Jenkings, Matthew F. Rech, and Rachel Woodward (London: Routledge, 2016), 301–316.
-
Tynan, Jane. “‘Tailoring in the Trenches’: The Making of First World War British Army Uniform”, in British Popular Culture and the First World War, ed. Jessica Meyer (Leiden: Brill, 2008), 71–93.
-
West, Stewart. “The Military, Policing and Decolonization in Sierra Leone, 1953–57.” Ferguson Centre for African and Asian Studies, Working Paper Number 4, May 2013.
| All Time | Past Year | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 439 | 262 | 35 |
| Full Text Views | 27 | 17 | 7 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 56 | 29 | 6 |
Visual Symbols and Military Culture in Britain’s West African Colonial Army (c.1900–60)
In: International Journal of Military History and HistoriographyAbstract
Visual symbols like uniforms, emblems and ceremonies became central in inventing British military culture among West African forces reflecting orientalist and ornamentalist interpretations of empire. While uniforms fostered military identity, the versions devised for West African soldiers reproduced racial stereotypes and military fashion trends. Granting insignia and Colours to West African units transformed them from simplistic paramilitaries to honoured members of the British imperial milieu. Colours served as ritual objects enabling West African forces to recreate pivotal cultural events of the British regimental system. The public presence of uniformed West African soldiers promoted a sense of imperial majesty that reinforced British rule. Travelling to Britain, West African troops participated in parades and exhibitions initially displaying the epic scale of the empire, but eventually these military visitors became symbols of colonial reform. With independence, Britain’s former colonies in West Africa retained Western-style military symbols altered to highlight republicanism and modernist aspirations.
| All Time | Past Year | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 439 | 262 | 35 |
| Full Text Views | 27 | 17 | 7 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 56 | 29 | 6 |