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Global Contact

Large spreadsheet documenting each foreign vessel that arrived in the port of Zanzibar which kept track of things such as the origin, size, and cargo of each visiting ship.
Source

List of Foreign Arrivals in the Port of Zanzibar from the 16th September 1832 to 26th May 1835

This is an ostensibly mundane document that contains a tremendous amount of information for interpreting the global dynamics of this period of history, all while peering out into the world from the tiny island of Zanzibar.

Picture of the title page of Edward Waring's book "Remarks on the Uses of Some of the Bazaar Medicines and Common Medical Plants of India"
Teaching

Short Teaching Module: Teaching the Intersection of Gender and Race through Colonial Medical Texts

This module focuses on medical texts written by British doctors working in India and their gendered and racial categorization of ailments and diseases.

Picture of the title page of Edward Waring's book "Remarks on the Uses of Some of the Bazaar Medicines and Common Medical Plants of India"
Source

Edward Waring on Borax as medicine in India

Waring published the book in several Indian languages and another publication Supplement to the Pharmacopoeia of India, written by Moodeen Sherriff, an Indian doctor working for the colonial administration, provided the translations and medical plant knowledge in 14 different languages.

Picture of the title page of Edward Waring's book "Remarks on the Uses of Some of the Bazaar Medicines and Common Medical Plants of India"
Source

Edward Waring on Assafœtida as medicine in India

Medical publications appealed to a medical and popular audience in the hopes of providing surgeons with tips on how to obtain similar drugs and medicine in local bazaars which could not be obtained elsewhere.

Page from the Pentaglot Manchu Glossary from
Source

Page from the Pentaglot Manchu Glossary

The Qing empire was founded by the Manchus, and they used a language and a script that were distinct from those used in China Proper.

Page from the Qing Veritable Records
Teaching

Short Teaching Module: Translation and a World History of the Qing Empire

In 1953, L. P. Hartley famously wrote: “The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there." His observation is particularly relevant for world historians, who have to engage in translation projects to bridge the distance between our world and the worlds of our historical actors.

Title page of Dr. William Ruschenberger's memoir
Teaching

Short Teaching Module: Global Microhistory and the Nineteenth-Century Omani Empire

In their primer essay, Jessica Hanser and Adam Clulow note how scholars of global microhistory explore relationships between macro and micro, deep structures and contingency, and big state actors and minor players.

First letter from the British military officer and diplomat Atkins Hamerton on British merchants in the East
Source

1841 Letter from Atkins Hamerton

Atkins Hamerton (d. 1857) was a British military officer and diplomat, who served as the first British Consul to the Omani Empire based in Zanzibar. He left behind thousands of pages of sources, presently scattered between archives in the U.K., Zanzibar, and India.

Title page of Dr. William Ruschenberger's memoir
Source

Memoir of William Ruschenberger

Dr. William Ruschenberger (d. 1895) was a United States Navy surgeon and was assigned to the USS Peacock, serving with Edmund Roberts as part of an American delegation representing the Jackson Administration to negotiate treaties with the Omani Empire and the Kingdom of Siam.

Painting of The Batavia Castle seen from the Kali Besar West
Teaching

Short Teaching Module: Spatial Histories of Law, Race and Empire

Law is not only to be found in doctrine and documents, but also in structures and materials, in buildings and in cloth, in paintings and in photos.