This special issue analyses how formal independence from colonial rule has impacted institutions and epistemologies of history writing in different parts of the world after 1945. The integrated collection of articles focuses on the transitions and ruptures of knowledge production taking place in the wake of states gaining their formal independence. It explores how different types of decolonisation led to different engagements with history writing, and by doing so we provide fresh perspectives on processes of knowledge decolonisation. In this introduction we situate the special issue in two bodies of literature: firstly, decolonial and postcolonial debates about history and epistemology, and secondly, the literature on the decolonisation process with a specific focus on memory and commemoration. We argue that a fuller understanding of the similarities and differences between knowledge decolonisation then and now requires solid historical contextualisation of the mid-century ideas and vocabularies.

I examine the two careers of British colonial administrator and Pacific historian Henry Evans Maude (1906-2006) to illuminate continuities between the logic of late-imperialism and foundational modes of Pacific historiography. Maude worked as a colonial servant in the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony from 1929, where he instigated two coerced resettlement schemes. In 1957, he joined the Department of Pacific History at the Australian National University, where he championed new modes of history writing tailored to the era of decolonisation—especially “island-centred” ethnohistory and “participant history.” I argue that Maude’s visions of empire and of the past were deeply linked, and that imbrications between the two informed the practices of an emerging professional Pacific history during the 1960s. Modes of history-writing that would come to be understood as critical of older imperial histories, or even as anti-colonial, had their origins in colonial structures. At the same time, both of Maude’s careers evinced a colonial notion of futurity; he understood himself as a benevolent expert able to guide Indigenous peoples into eventual independence.

This paper examines the history-making of the first two Raffles Professors of History at the University of Malaya, C.N. Parkinson and K.G. Tregonning, to demonstrate the impact Malaya’s decolonisation had on the historiographical practices of the university’s History Department. It argues that both historians, animated by Malaya’s decolonisation, attempted to re-frame Malayan history – through adopting a ‘world-historical’ and ‘autonomous history’ framework respectively – to meet what they perceived were the needs of a post-independence multiracial Malaya. Although both historians claimed to be producing histories for an independent Malaya, and while their frameworks were indeed methodologically innovative, both historians ultimately produced histories that continued to frame Malayan history using western frameworks. They were thus partially decolonised historians writing partially decolonised histories for a partially decolonised Malaya.

This article re-examines the relationship between two key historiographical traditions seeking an epistemological sovereignty at the University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM) in the 1960s. The first, sometimes dubbed the “Dar school of historiography” and associated with Tanzanian President Julius Nyerere’s recruitment of Terence Ranger to build a new History department at the University, centred “African initiative” as the sine qua non of any approach to the continent that was serious about breaking with Eurocentric epistemologies and approaching African histories on their own terms. The second was “dependency theory” or “world systems theory,” for which UDSM became a centre as Dar es Salaam’s fame in global leftwing circles attracted Marxist academics like Walter Rodney, Immanuel Wallerstein, and Giovanni Arrighi. In contrast to the “Dar School,” these scholars worked at a distinctly global scale and future-oriented timeline. Comparing the epistemological approaches of these schools as different attempts at a meaningful decolonisation of knowledge, the article also re-embeds them in the material politics of the University at the time. For underneath UDSM’s two expatriate-driven “schools” was a gradual but significant decolonisation of the professoriat happening just below their scholarly radars – one in which Walter Rodney, not coincidentally, would play a major role.

Compared to most other cases of independence, the creation of Libya is generally regarded as a conservative outcome. Rather than being founded on a nationalist impulse, the United Kingdom of Libya derived its legitimacy from Islam, specifically following the path of the Sanūsiyya—one of the key symbols of anti-colonial resistance—whose religious leader became the first king of the new state. As a primarily religious movement, however, the Sanūsiyya’s influence was unevenly distributed across the country. Consequently, when Idris al-Sanūsī ascended the throne, his political legitimacy was not universally acknowledged. Within this context, both history and historiography played a strategic role in the construction and contestation of political legitimacy. This paper aims to analyse historiographical narratives produced during the 1940s and 1950s, viewing independence as a process that transcends the moment of its formal proclamation. The objective is twofold: first, to investigate the construction of a “Sanūsī epistemological sovereignty” through historical revision and the promotion of a pro-monarchist historiography; and second, to examine its role in legitimising the new state and in fostering a shared sense of identity and nationhood.

The public sphere burgeoned in Korea with the country’s liberation from Japanese colonial rule in 1945, but it took South Korean intellectuals almost two decades to begin questioning the vision of Korean history formed under Japanese influence. This article explores the decolonisation of Korean historiography as reflected in the leading intellectual magazine of the time, Sasanggye (1953–1970). The analysis demonstrates a rapid substitution of the Japanese knowledge system with the American one and a more gradual change in Sasanggye contributors’ attitudes toward history, from the unconditional application of Western standards to a desire to write a “subjective history” of Korea from their own perspective. Still, the epistemology remained only partially decolonised as many epistemes of the colonial era persisted in the circumstances of colonial education-induced myopia, overwhelming American influence, national division and rivalry with North Korea, as well as the even more partial decolonisation of politics, economy, and diplomacy.

Hong Kong’s history remains contested during its decolonisation. The colonial government of Hong Kong, the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and historians at the University of Hong Kong (HKU) all attempted to interpret the past in their own right. This article argues that the contest for epistemological territory between the Chinese and British colonial governments led to the fragmented accounts of Hong Kong history in official curricula. Unlike other cases, Hong Kong’s decolonisation did not result in independence. Instead, the United Kingdom transferred the colony’s sovereignty to the PRC in 1997. Both sides attempted to showcase their right and ability to shape the colony’s past. Instead of having an ultimate “winner,” both occupied a share of the epistemological territory regarding historical knowledge, producing fragmented accounts of the past. The article also recovers and examines the agency of locally trained historians. These people of Hong Kong did not have any chance to produce their own “autonomous history” precisely because of the impossibility of independence. This process resulted in the partially decolonised yet censored historical narratives that persist in Hong Kong under Chinese rule. Through this case, this article calls for further discussion of what ‘decolonisation’ meant for actors beyond the state.

The History of Mankind-project (HoM) was carried out from 1944–76 under the auspices of UNESCO with the aim of producing a non-eurocentric history of the world from prehistory to the present. The article analyses how the mid-century wave of independence changed the HoM-project. In hindsight a trajectory can be identified from decolonisation as a marginal concern to a new situation where decolonisation as political process and epistemological agenda influenced the HoM with respect to its political aims, organisational structure, the selection of authors, and the narrative of world history it presented. As such it is a clear story of how the end of empire altered how world history has been conceptualised and written. The article explores this theme across four HoM volumes and breaks fresh ground by investigating the agency of individual author-editors and the actual historical narratives they produced in the published volumes. We argue that the approaches and the organisation of the HoM were challenged as anti-eurocentrism in history writing became coupled increasingly to decolonisation and the quest for epistemological sovereignty.

In this article I discuss the issue of place in the creation of decolonised historiography and argue that the location from where a historian produces historiography matters in terms of both conceptual and ideological influences as well as in regards to material circumstances. Making use of a case-study on the UNESCO General History of Africa Project (1964-1998), I bring postcolonial critique on the conceptual nature of academic history writing into conversation with a study of the scholarly practice of the UNESCO project to show that conceptual critique has its limits if it does not take material circumstances into consideration. Political decolonisation in Africa was connected to history writing, thereby blending conceptual and material considerations. Secondly, I look at some of the discussions that were ongoing within the UNESCO project to show that the historians working on it discussed these issues amongst themselves and were aware of critique levelled against them. In doing so I argue that decolonisation of knowledge production as a result of becoming politically independent is a multivarious and ongoing process which has to take into account all these different elements.

Within the dynamic realm of historiography and the generation of knowledge, the process of “Becoming Independent” serves as a profound testament to the tenacity and resolve exhibited by a wide array of intellectual communities in their efforts to confront and transform established narratives. This afterword explores the themes in this special issue, which not only offers a critical analysis of historiographical practices from both past and present but also emphasises the imperative for ongoing dedication in the endeavour to cultivate diverse and independent historical narratives. By discussing the different articles of this collection, the afterword explores shared themes, such as the decoloniality of historical scholarship through ethnographic inquiry, prospects of de-emphasising the Eurocentric gaze, fragmentation of history as evidence of varied epistemological sovereignties, and the decolonial agenda through “white expatriates.” By doing so, this Afterword serves as a resounding appeal for the continuous pursuit of intellectual liberation.

This article investigates the nature of Dutch and English empire in the early modern period through the variety of joint Anglo-Dutch imperial ventures Dutch and English people founded. The article uses seven case studies of sets of imperial projects that included different elements of Anglo-Dutch cooperation to show that Dutch and English people pursued these collaborations largely because they sought profit and wanted to frame their efforts around the Protestant cause, rather than national glory. The article contributes to scholarship on early modern transimperial cooperation, proposing that the Anglo-Dutch case deserves particular attention due to the large number of ventures involved and the range of formality and legality they spanned. The article also argues that Anglo-Dutch imperial collaboration was of particular importance to the growing English empire. It finds that almost every English imperial project in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century contained Anglo-Dutch elements. It therefore suggests that the early English empire was, in many ways, an Anglo-Dutch empire.

The objective of this study is to examine the policies of the Russian Empire and Persia regarding the election of the Catholicos of All Armenians. The expansionist ambitions of the Russian Empire in the South Caucasus led to confrontation with Persia, and within this context the cultivation of a pro-Russian worldview among the Armenian population became a priority for Russian authorities. Consequently, the Catholicosate of All Armenians—the most influential Armenian institution of the period—emerged as a target of both Russian and Persian intervention.

The election of the Catholicos thus became a primary foreign policy issue for the two empires. The electoral process itself reveals divisions within the Armenian clergy, as rival factions sought to establish a Catholicos under Russian or Persian patronage. Taking advantage of these circumstances, Tsarist authorities actively intervened, promoting their preferred candidates and thereby breaking with the traditional practice of autonomous election.

This study draws on archival documents from the Catholicosate of All Armenians, which provide the basis for a comprehensive analysis of the election process, the responses of the Armenian clergy, the manifestations of Russian-Persian rivalry, the resulting diplomatic confrontations, and the involvement of the Ottoman Empire. By systematically reconstructing these events from original sources, the study highlights the ways in which imperial rivalries directly shaped Armenian ecclesiastical life, offering new insights into the intersection of religious authority and regional power politics in the South Caucasus.

Mobility has become a central focus of research into material culture. We chart the life-cycle of one mobile object: a painting commissioned in 1790s Peru by an indigenous man, painted by an indigenous artist, and intended for the king of Spain. Its history demonstrates the importance of exploring not simply the fact that objects moved around, but the particular reasons why they were in motion, and the particular ways in which they circulated. In the case of this painting, its creation, trajectory, disappearance, and afterlife were determined by two forms of damage characteristic of the eighteenth century: colonial violence and imperial warfare. These forces set objects in motion, and they conditioned the ways in which this painting was repeatedly reinterpreted and physically rearranged. Its history exemplifies the interconnections between imperial and colonial conflict, and the mobility and reception of artworks in this globalising era. Warfare and violence, we show, were powerful, and overlooked, factors that shaped the meanings and changing materiality of objects as they circulated.