After Empire Must Come Nation?

During the last two decades a revisionist wave has gripped the historiography about imperial breakups. A venerable topic at least since World War I, generations of historians strove to explain why multinational empires crumbled to give way to nation-states. The entire…

The ‘Other’ Bandung

Historians everywhere view the 1955 Asia-Africa Conference as the starting point for Afro-Asianism. The conference has become such a byword for Afro-Asian solidarity that the simple invocation of ‘Bandung’, the city in which it was held, conjures up familiar images of the leaders of newly…

Skies That Bind: Air Travel in the Bandung Era

In the 1950s, conferences were essential in creating notions of solidarity and…

The Afro-Asian Moment

Before I became a professional historian, I was lucky enough to visit Bandung — a cool, green city in the hills of Java…

‘Real time’ collaboration in global history: the future?

Exploiting Digital Mapping without creating maps of exploitation

Interactive visual mapping is a powerful medium for historians. Where people, places, and…

A Champion for Socialist China

“Do you know who Wu Chuanyu is?” Mao Zedong asked a group of swimmers from Wuhan in 1958. “Is there anyone now who can do better than him? You should learn from Wu Chuanyu and surpass him!”