Maya Jasanoff

Between 1775 and 1783, 60,000 American loyalists—colonists who supported Britain in the American Revolution—fled with 15,000 slaves from the new United States to resettle in other parts of the British Empire. Their experiences cast into relief a transformative moment in British imperial history, when the empire's ethical, territorial, and political foundations were reshaped. This project, the first global history of the loyalist diaspora, follows loyalist refugees to every corner of the British world to investigate the ideological, cultural, and institutional effects of their exodus. It aims to upset conventional nation-centered narratives about the American Revolution and reposition ideas of governance and belonging in the British imperial world.