By: Andy Prevalsky
Rudyard Kipling Background Information
Rudyard Kipling - "White Man's Burden"
At the same time missionaries sought to introduce religion, specifically Christianity, to subject peoples, others worked to bring them "civilization" in the form of social stability and political order. French imperialists time and time again invoked the "civilizing mission" as their justification for their expansion into Africa and Asia (similar to how America used the idea of manifest destiny), and the English poet and writer Rudyard Kipling defined the "white man's burden" as the obligation of European and Euro-American peoples to bring their wealth of knowledge and defined rule to distant lands.
America's Stance on Imperialism
The Americans whole heartily endorsed the imperialistic attitudes offered by the ideas of Imperialism and by Rudyard Kipling. Ever since the introduction of gunpowder in the thirteenth century, European states and America had competed vigorously to develop increasingly powerful military technologies, Industrialization essentially enhanced these efforts of Imperialism by making it possible to produce massive quantities of advanced weapons and tools.
During the nineteenth century industrialists devised effective technologies of transportation, communication, and war that enabled European imperialists to have their way in the larger world. These specific technologies of transportation, military, communication all collaborative influenced imperialism and generally gave imperialism a motive. These important innovations include the steam boat, which helped the circumference and growth of imperialism by expanding any countries ability to travel and this conquer. As the ability to travel and reach these conquerable lands was very important, so was the ability to capitalize on the situation and actually conquer the land, military technologies of advanced firearms established and allowed imperialism to become more widespread, as wars were heavily favored towards the country with developed weapons. In addition to the availability of transportation and advanced firearm technology was the invention of the telegraph which made it possible to exchange messages at an even faster pace then previously available before with steamboats, this allowed cohesive war strategies to be easily executed and gave imperialistic nations an upper hand when warring.
These Inventions allowed Imperialism not only to grow and establish its influence throughout much of Europe, but it also influenced America to expand and conquer the way it did.