British Attitudes (inter war years)

Question 1

When was the British Empire exhibition at Wembley Park

Answer 1

1924

Question 2

What does the fun-fair at the Wembley empire exhibition suggest about attitudes to empire at the time

Answer 2

the fact they had to put in a funfair could suggest that people didn’t actually care about empire- more just a day out with the family then wanting to know about empire

Question 3

What does the Empire Christmas Pudding suggest about government attitudes to empire

Answer 3

saw empire as a way to recover economically- wanted to promote self sufficiency

Question 4

When was the Empire Marketing Board set up

Answer 4

1926

Question 5

What was the purpose of the Empire Marketing Board

Answer 5

promoted the consumption in Britain of items produced in Empire through posters and advertising campaigns

Question 6

Why did the Empire Marketing Board become more active in the 1930s

Answer 6

following the great depression- international trade declined drastically and the Empire became even more important to the British economy

Question 7

How much did the nationwide series of public lectures cost the Board and the British taxpayer in 1929

Answer 7

£10,500

Question 8

How many lectures about empire were given in 1929 and how many people went to the lectures

Answer 8

2,400 lectures given to around 500,000 people

Question 9

What topics were discussed during the nationwide public lecture series

Answer 9

‘The British Empire and What it Means to You’

Question 10

What does the nationwide lecture series tell us about British attitudes to empire

Answer 10

Maybe that not enough people were interested in the empire- government had to spend money to give lectures across the country- wouldn’t have to if there was great support for the Empire

Question 11

How many copies of the Empire Marketing Board’s Calendar of the Fruits and Vegetables of Empire were distributed

Answer 11

180,000 in 1929

Question 12

How many Empire Marketing Board pamphleys had been issued by June 1933

Answer 12

10 million

Question 13

How much did the National and local newspapers cost the government

Answer 13

£364,280

Question 14

When did the buy British campaign start

Answer 14

Autumn 1931

Question 15

What were the Empire Shopping Weeks

Answer 15

for a week retailers in different towns around the country were persuaded to plaster their shop windows with adverts for Empire products and to press Empire goods on their customers- prizes were awarded for the best displays

Question 16

How many Empire Shopping Weeks were sponsored in different towns in 1930

Answer 16

200 Empire Shopping Weeks in 65 towns

Question 17

How much did the Empire Shopping Weeks cost the Empire Marketing Board in total

Answer 17

£277,771

Question 18

What did the brief bulletins broadcast weekly to housewives

Answer 18

empire produce in season

recipes emphasising Empire ingredients

Question 19

How many listeners of the weekly bulletins wrote in for copies of recipes in 1929

Answer 19

20,000

Question 20

When did the British documentary film movement return to Britain

Answer 20

Jan 1927

Question 21

What does the large amount of money spent by the Empire Marketing Board tell us about attitudes to Empire

Answer 21

Shows that Empire was very important to the British government as a means of economic stability post WW1 and great depression
Also shows that the general British public were less concerned with the Empire- had to spend all this money promoting it

Question 22

How much did expenditure on advertising increase by between 1920 and 1928

Answer 22

increased from £31 million in 1920 to £57 million in 1928

Question 23

What was on display at the Wembley Exhibition

Answer 23

re-enactments of WW1 encounters and see imperial fauna and flora, exotic animals and plants

Question 24

How much was admission to the Wembley Exhibition

Answer 24

1 shilling per adult and 9 pence for children

Question 25

How many people visited the Wembley Exhibition in total

Answer 25

27,403,267- over half the British public

Question 26

How much in total did the Wembley Exhibition cost

Answer 26

£11 million

Question 27

How did the BBC promote a one sided view of Empire

Answer 27

broadcatsed programmes such as readings of Kipling’s poetry and performances Edward Elgar’s marches and ensured critical perspectives never got airtime

Question 28

When was the Empire Film Unit set up

Answer 28

1930

Question 29

What type of films did the Empire Film Unit create

Answer 29

produced hundreds of documentary films that sought to inform viewers about the empire and persuade them of tis value to their lives

Question 30

What were some of the most popular commercial films about imperial adventure called

Answer 30

She (1925)
The Four Feathers (1939)
Sanders of the River (1935)
Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935)

Question 31

What did the British Board of Film Censors do

Answer 31

ensured that the public did not see films that portrayed the British in a negative light, diminished the dignity of whites or blur the boundaries between the races (wanted to maintain racial differences

Question 32

What was the nature of the 1925 Special Restriction Order

Answer 32

gave the state the power to expel lascars (non white sailors) from British shores

Question 33

Why did the stage production of Othello cause outcry

Answer 33

the black actor (Paul Robeson) kissed his white co-star (Peggy Ashcroft)

Question 34

Who wrote Passage to India

Answer 34

E M Forsters

Question 35

Passage to India- why was it influential

Answer 35

one of the most influential novels written about the empire as he wrote it as a half insider because he had been a provate secretary to the Maharajah of Dewas State Senior

Question 36

What a Passage to India about

Answer 36

human nature playing itself against an imperial background between people of different origins thrown together by the imperial chance
British technique by ‘The Club’ in the novel- ugly system based upon racial awareness and arrogance but still undeniably effective in sustaining the brazen bluff that lay at the heart of empire
one of the main characters said- ‘we’re not pleasant in India, we’ve something more important to do’
not an ideological novel BUT still depicts Indians as people who couldn’t look after themselves HOWEVER criticised the unbridgeable gulfs created by Amritsar

Question 37

What was Four Feathers about

Answer 37

thrilling justification of imperial attitudes