Berlin Conference (1884–1885)

The Berlin Conference of 1884–1885 ushered in what became known as the ‘New Imperialism’. While the first waves of European expansion had focused on the Americas and Asia, the third one concentrated on Africa, largely ignored since the conclusion of the Atlantic slave trade. In 1876 King Leopold II (1835–1909) of Belgium hired Henry Morton Stanley (1841–1904) to explore and colonize the Congo River basin of equatorial Africa. Belgian claims to the Congo led to a ‘scramble for Africa’ amongst France, Germany, Great Britain and Portugal, represented at the Conference. They sought to regulate colonial competition by defining ‘effective occupation’ as the criterion for recognition of territorial claims—colonies were recognized if actually possessed. The Berlin Conference remapped Africa without considering cultural or linguistic borders, dividing the continent into some 50 different colonies. Only Ethiopia and Liberia remained independent. The New Imperialism gave rise to new social views of colonialism, including the idea of ‘civilizing’ Africans, as described in Rudyard Kipling’s poem ‘The White Man’s Burden’ (1899), while critiqued by others such as Joseph Conrad in Heart of Darkness (1899). European powers tried to associate colonial rule with the goals of justice and morality, resulting in the rule over tropical lands gaining widespread acceptance.

Increasing Online Discoverability of a Mixed-Format Collection

The Collection In 2004, Smithsonian Libraries acquired the mixed-format Russell E. Train Africana Collection for its special collections division. This collection contained items that had broad public appeal and significant historical value. The collection’s diversity of materials has been a source of excitement and challenge since Smithsonian Libraries acquired it in 2004. Judge Russell E. Train created the collection around his decades-long fascination with the history of exploration and wildlife in Africa. Train acquired materials from historic figures like Theodore Roosevelt during his African Expedition in 1909–1910, as well as explorers David Livingstone and Henry Morton Stanley. The collection includes . . .

1. What is (and is not) exploration?

‘What is (and is not) exploration?’ discusses what it means to explore and be an explorer by considering explorations and discoveries through history by Leif Eiriksson, Christopher Columbus, Meriwether Lewis, William Clark, Alexander von Humboldt, Henry Morton Stanley, Richard Burton, John Hanning Speke, David Livingstone, and James Cook. Exploration is often fundamentally about mediation, intercession, cultural negotiation, and sometimes, even, symbiosis. Exploration also encouraged some form of occupation, conquest, or control. Explorers were the primary agents of contact not just between cultures and peoples, but between whole ecosystems and environments. To that joint anthropological and ecological extent, exploration ultimately means change: it is a particularly adventurous form of original travel involving discovery, cultural contact, and change.