New Books in History Georgios Giannakopoulos, "The Interpreters: British Internationalism and Empire in Southeastern Europe, 1870-1930" (Manchester UP, 2025)
Nov 7, 2025
Georgios Giannakopoulos, a lecturer in Modern History at City St. George's, explores his book on British internationalism and empire in Southeastern Europe. He discusses how British intellectuals navigated regional nationalisms, using figures like Arthur Evans to reshape narratives about the area. Georgios dives into the impact of the 1870s, the politics of archaeology, and the role of gender in historical narratives. He also reflects on the legacy of these interpreters and their influence on both wartime policies and postwar discussions.
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Regions As Constructed Political Categories
- British intellectuals used Southeastern Europe to interrogate broad categories like East and West and rethink geopolitical imaginaries.
- Georgios Giannakopoulos links 9/11-era category questions to historical knowledge production about the Balkans and Smyrna.
Interpreters And The Politics Of Translation
- 'Interpreters' captures the power imbalance and inevitable misunderstanding in translating regional claims for British audiences.
- Giannakopoulos frames Southeastern Europe's crises as analogue problems to those faced by the British Empire, like the Irish question.
1870s: Eastern Question Enters British Politics
- The 1870s made the Eastern Question acute and inserted Southeastern European crises into British domestic politics.
- Humanitarian outrages in Ottoman provinces transformed faraway regions into parliamentary issues in Britain.
