DBQ Responses to Imperialism (V1)

: Analyze the following documents and answer the questions that follow. Consider the perspectives and motivations of the individuals and groups involved in the context of imperialism.

Document 1 Source: Prempeh I, Ashanti leader, response to a British offer of protectorate status, West Africa, 1891

The suggestion that Ashanti in its present state should come and enjoy the protection of Her Majesty the Queen of England and Empress of India is a matter of very serious consideration. I am pleased to announce that we have arrived at the conclusion that my kingdom of Ashanti will never commit itself to any such policy. Ashanti must remain as of old and at the same time remain friendly with all White men.

Document 2 Source: Source: Raden Ajeng Kartini, Javanese aristocrat and pioneer in education for women during the Dutch colonial period, “Letters of a Javanese Princess,” 1901

There are many, yes very many [Dutch] Government officials, who allow the native rulers* to kiss their feet, and their knees. Kissing the foot is the highest token of respect that we Javanese can show to our parents, or elderly blood relatives, and to our own rulers. We do not find it pleasant to do this for strangers; no, the European makes himself ridiculous in our eyes whenever he demands from us those tokens of respect to which our own rulers alone have the right. . . . In many subtle ways they make us feel their dislike. “I am a European, you are a Javanese,” they seem to say, or “I am the master, you the governed.” Not once, but many times, they speak to us in broken Malay; although they know very well that we understand the Dutch language. *The Dutch government controlled most of the islands of present-day Indonesia directly, but some local rulers had been allowed to administer their territories on behalf of the Dutch

Document 3 Source: Letter from Queen Liliuokalani to the United States December 1898

I, Liliuokalani of Hawaii, named heir apparent on the 10th day of April, 1877, and proclaimed Queen of the Hawaiian Islands on the 29th day of January, 1891, do hereby, earnestly and respectfully protest against the assertion of ownership by the United States of America of the so-called Hawaiian Crown Lands amounting to about one million acres and which are my property, and I especially protest against such assertion of ownership as a taking of property without due process of law and without just or other compensation. Therefore, supplementing my protest of June 17, 1897, I call upon the President and the National Legislature and the People of the United States to do justice in this matter and to restore to me this property, the enjoyment of which is being withheld from me by your Government under what must be a misapprehension of my right and title.

Document 4 Source: Ethiopian painting of the Battle of Adowa, in which the Ethiopians were victorious over Italian troops, 1896.

Document 5 Source: Yaa Asantewaa, Ashanti queen mother, speech to chiefs, West Africa, 1900.

Now I have seen that some of you fear to go forward and fight for our King. If it were in the brave days of old, some chiefs would not sit down to see their King taken away without firing a shot. No White man could have dared to speak to chiefs of the Ashanti in the way the British governor spoke to you chiefs this morning. Is it true that the bravery of the Ashanti is no more? I cannot believe it. Yea, it cannot be! I must say this; if you the men of Ashanti will not go forward, then we will. We the women will. I shall call upon my fellow women. We will fight the White men. We will fight until the last of us falls on the battlefields.

Document 6 Source: Samuel Maherero, a leader of the Herero people, letter to another African leader, German South-West Africa, 1904.

All our obedience and patience with the Germans is of little avail, for each day they shoot someone dead for no reason at all. Hence I appeal to you my Brother, not to hold aloof from the uprising, but to make your voice heard so that all Africa may take up arms against the Germans. Let us die fighting rather than die as a result of maltreatment, imprisonment, or some other calamity. Tell all the chiefs down there to rise and do battle.

Document 7 Source: Blowing from a Gun, 1858. The image below is from the Indian Rebellion of 1857 (also called the Sepoy Mutiny). Following Mughal precedents, the British frequently employed a form of public execution for rebels- to tie the victim to the mouth of a cannon and then fired it. The practice was used extensively during the Indian uprising of 1857-58. The British argued it served as a deterrent to rebellion.

Prompt: Evaluate the extent to which indigenous peoples’ responses to Western imperialism differed in the period 1750-1900.