Prof. John M. MacKenzie
Author and Historian of Empire
Biography
John MacKenzie began his
schooling in Zambia and is a
graduate of the universities of
Glasgow and British Columbia
(Vancouver). He spent 34 years in
the history department at
Lancaster University where he
held the chair of imperial history.
He was also Principal of the
County College, the first Dean of
Arts and Humanities, and later
Dean of Education.
He has taught at the
University of British Columbia,
Wilfrid Laurier University
(Ontario) and the universities
of Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) and
Liverpool.
He holds, or has held,
honorary professorships at the
Scottish universities of
Aberdeen, St Andrews and
Stirling, and an honorary
professorial fellowship at
Edinburgh University. He is also
Visiting Professor at the
University of the Highlands and
Islands (UHI) and a Fellow of
the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
In 2021 he was awarded an
honorary doctorate by Aix-
Marseille University, France.
John established the
Manchester University Press
‘Studies in Imperialism’ series
in 1984, which has become the
largest and most significant
series in the field of imperial
cultural history. He remained
its editor until his retirement
in 2012 when the series
numbered over 120 volumes.
He has edited a number
of journals, including
Environment and History
(2000-2005), and until recently
He was historical
consultant for the ‘David
Livingstone and the Victorian
Encounter with Africa’ exhibition
at the National Portrait Gallery,
London, and the Royal Academy,
Edinburgh, in 1997; and for the
‘Victorian Vision’ exhibition at
the V&A Museum, London, in
2001. He edited and contributed
to the catalogues for both
exhibitions, and most recently to
the catalogue associated with the
Orientalism exhibition, ‘Inspired
by the East: how the Islamic
World influenced Western art’,
at the British Museum (2019-20).
John has made a number of
television and radio programmes
associated with the history of the
British Empire and has also
travelled extensively in the
Commonwealth territories. He
currently lives in Perthshire,
Scotland.
was editor in chief of Britain and
the World, the journal of the British
Scholar Society. He has been on the
editorial board of several others
including the Journal of Imperial
and Commonwealth History.