An Empire of 'Growth and Nurture': Agriculture, Documentary Film, and Development in Britain's Empire Marketing Board, 1926–1933. (November 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Erickson, Paul
• Is Part Of: Contemporary European history. Volume 31:Number 4(2022)
• Page Start: 509
• Page End: 524
• Publication Date: 2022-11
• Subjects: Europe -- History -- 1945- -- Periodicals; 940.5
• DOI: 10.1017/S0960777322000674
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0960-7773

Abstract

Abstract : Writing in the mid-1940s, the British civil servant Sir Stephen Tallents would reflect that the interwar period saw a shift in terms of how 'thoughtful Britons' viewed their empire: less in terms of 'machinery and organisation' and more in terms of 'growth and nurture'. This essay interprets Tallents' remarkable observation in light of the history of an organisation with which his career was closely associated: the Empire Marketing Board (1926–33). By examining together the diverse activities of this organisation, which ranged from funding agricultural, ecological, and economic research to producing documentary films, this essay contextualises the emergence of Tallents' view of imperial growth and development.