Narratives of Euro-American Imperialism: Past, Present, and Future

E. Leigh McKagen

Chapter 25 in Research Handbook on Global Governance, 2025, pp 551-569 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: This chapter contends that contemporary storytelling perpetuates elements inherent in European and American imperial domination starting in the fifteenth century. Storytelling extends beyond fiction, influencing global culture and governance, and the naturalization and normalization of imperial practices inhibits exploration of non-imperial alternatives. Embracing recent transdisciplinary movements, I advocate for diverse forms of storytelling that emphasize non-imperial global identity, culture, and governance. To do so, I first discuss key Euro-American imperial practices to demonstrate how processes of empire permeated not only “new” regions of the world, but also ways of thinking about the world. I then delve into Western literature to identify imperial elements present in storytelling from the seventeenth century to the present, underscoring the pervasiveness of imperial ideologies in Western storytelling, culture, and identity. Finally, I examine alternative approaches, including narratives of colonial resistance and contemporary initiatives for reimagining relationships in order to avoid traditional Western-centric narrative frameworks.

Keywords: Storytelling; Narratives of imperialism; Narratives of resistance; CoFuturisms; Non-imperial futures (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
ISBN: 9781789906325
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