The new activity of trans-continental civil flying in the 1930s is a useful vantage point for viewing the extension of British imperial attitudes and practices. Cultures and caricatures of British imperial aviation examines the experiences of those (mostly men) who flew solo or with a companion (racing or for leisure), who were airline passengers (doing colonial administration, business or research), or who flew as civilian air and ground crews. For airborne elites, flying was a modern and often enviable way of managing, using and experiencing empire. On the ground, aviation was a device for asserting old empire: adventure and modernity were accompanied by supremacism. At the time, however, British civil imperial flying was presented romantically in books, magazines and exhibitions. Eighty years on, imperial flying is still remembered, reproduced and re-enacted in caricature.

Gordon Pirie is Deputy Director of the African Centre for Cities at the University of Cape Town

General editors introduction1.IntroductionPART I Private flying2.Aerial adventure3.Seeking supremacy4.Imperial encountersPART II Commercial flying5.PAX Britannica6.Imperial journeys7.Personifying EmpirePART III Virtual flying8.Imperial plumage9.Imperial passages10.Re-flying Empire11.ConclusionIndex