Imperial Material - 9780226828480

The University of Chicago Press

Imperial MaterialNational Symbols in the US Colonial Empire\nAuthor(s): Alvita Akiboh\nFormat: Paperback\nPublisher: The University of Chicago Press, United States\nImprint: University of Chicago Press\nISBN-13: 9780226828480, 978-0226828480\nSynopsis\nAn ambitious history of flags, stamps, and currencyand the role they played in US imperialism.\n In Imperial Material, Alvita Akiboh reveals how US national identity has been created, challenged, and transformed through embodiments of empire found in US territories, from the US dollar bill to the fifty-star flag. These symbolic objects encode the relationships between territoriesincluding the Philippines, the Hawaiian Islands, Puerto Rico, and Guamand the empire with which they have been entangled. Akiboh shows how such items became objects of local power, their original intent transmogrified. For even if imperial territories were not always front and center for federal lawmakers and administrators, their inhabitants remained continuou.