A critique of East Indian indentured historiography in the Caribbean

Abstract

A careful analysis of East Indian (hereafter Indian) indentured historiography in the Caribbean reveals an upsurge in published studies in the past three decades. These studies have arguably enhanced and advanced our understanding of Indian experience during indenture. However, these studies also have some serious shortcomings. Specifically, most studies have used the records of the colonizers to write the history, narrative, and memory of colonized indentured Indian servants. Moreover, across published studies, the numerical statistics on indentured service in the Caribbean are inconsistent. Published studies tend to focus on particular regions in the Caribbean. Comparative analyses of indenture within the former and present European Caribbean colonies and elsewhere are rare. This article provides a critique of Indian indentured historiography in the Caribbean with the hope and expectation of challenging the status quo as well as instigating new trends.

Keywords::

• East Indians
• indentured historiography
• Caribbean
• critique

Notes

^1.Spivak, “Can the Subaltern Speak?”

^2.Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth.

^3.Said, Orientalism.

^4.Bhabha, The Location of Culture.

^5.Guha, A Subaltern Studies Reader.

^6.Bastian, Owning Memory.

^7.Hardeen, “The Brown Atlantic.”

^8. See Bahadur, Coolie Woman.

^9. See Kanhai, Bindi.

^10.Grierson, Report on Colonial Emigration; , Notes on Emigration from India to British Guiana, Notes on Emigration from India to Jamaica, Notes on Emigration from India to Surinam, Notes on Emigration from India to Trinidad, and Notes on Emigration from India to British Guiana, Trinidad.

^11.Tinker, A New System; , A History, and Benevolent Neutrality; Dabydeen and SamarooIntroduction to Across, and India in the Caribbean; Look Lai, Indentured Labor; , Maharani's Misery, and Transient to Settlers; Laurence, A Question of Labour; Hoefte, In Place of Slavery; Roopnarine, Indo-Caribbean Indenture.

^12.Tinker, A New System.

^13.Laurence, A Question of Labor.

^14.Seecharan, Becchu ‘Bound Coolie’.

^15.Mahabir, The Still Cry.

^16.Vatuk, “Protest Songs.”

^17. Indian Conference in the Caribbean, International East Indian Diaspora Conference: East Indians in the Caribbean: Reflections of the Past; Charting the Way Forward at the University of the West Indies, Trinidad on the 28th and 29th of May 2005; Indian Conference in the Caribbean, Indian Diaspora in the Caribbean Conference: The Global Interface on St Augustine Campus, Trinidad, on the 21 and 22 of May 2004; Indian conference in the Caribbean, from Indentureship to Entrepreneurship: East Indians and the Socio-Economic Transition in the Caribbean, University of the West Indies, St Augustine, Trinidad, 2003.

^18.Look Lai, Indentured Labor; Roopnarine, “Regulations and Remittances.”

^19.Mahoney and Rueschemeyer, “Introduction,” 6.

^20. See note 12 above.

^21.Ramnarine, “Over a Hundred Years”; Haraksingh, “Control and Resistance”; Mangru, A History; Roopnarine, Indo-Caribbean Indenture; Mahase, “Plenty a Dem.”

^22. See note 7 above.

^23. Ibid.

^24.Mohapatra, “Restoring the Family.”

^25.Saha, Emigration of Indian Labor.

^26.Roopnarine, “Re-adjustment and Re-migration.”

^27.Roopnarine, “A Comparative Analysis.”

^28.Roopnarine, “Regulations and Remittances.”

^29. Mangru, Benevolent Neutrality.

^30.Hosein, “Unlikely Matriarchs.”

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Lomarsh Roopnarine

Lomarsh Roopnarine is Associate Professor of Caribbean and Latin American History in the College of Liberal Arts at Jackson State University, MS. He is the author of Indo-Caribbean Resistance and Accommodation, Kingston: University of the West Indies Press, 2007. Dr Roopnarine's work has appeared in more than three dozen reputable peer-reviewed journals globally.