Girmitiyas and the Global Indian Diaspora:Origins, Memories, and Identity (Global South Asians)

by: Ashutosh Kumar (Editor),Crispin Bates(Editor)

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Publication Date: 31 May 2024

Language: English

Print Length: 260 pages

ISBN-10: 1009342614

ISBN-13: 9781009342612

Book Description

Many Indians joueyed out of India to supplant the loss of slave labour in the former European plantation colonies of Mauritius, South Africa, Fiji, and the Caribbean from the early nineteenth century onwards. This book aims to highlight the careers of these migrants who served as vital agents in building the global society of the twenty-first century. It explores the transformative experiences of those who migrated, and the memories of those who did not retu after expiration of their contracts but chose instead to stay in their respective host countries. It describes the many challenges they faced ― ageing in a society far from home, the loss of their formal Indian identity after Indian independence, their efforts to preserve a sense of community in the post-independence societies of South Africa and the Caribbean, and their adapting to the new political and social realities they faced as minorities in the countries in which their ancestors had adventurously determined to settle and live.
Many Indians joueyed out of India to supplant the loss of slave labour in the former European plantation colonies of Mauritius, South Africa, Fiji, and the Caribbean from the early nineteenth century onwards. This book aims to highlight the careers of these migrants who served as vital agents in building the global society of the twenty-first century. It explores the transformative experiences of those who migrated, and the memories of those who did not retu after expiration of their contracts but chose instead to stay in their respective host countries. It describes the many challenges they faced ― ageing in a society far from home, the loss of their formal Indian identity after Indian independence, their efforts to preserve a sense of community in the post-independence societies of South Africa and the Caribbean, and their adapting to the new political and social realities they faced as minorities in the countries in which their ancestors had adventurously determined to settle and live.