Home | Best Seller | FAQ | Contact Us
Browse
Art & Photography
Biographies & Autobiography
Body,Mind & Health
Business & Economics
Children's Book
Computers & Internet
Cooking
Crafts,Hobbies & Gardening
Entertainment
Family & Parenting
History
Horror
Literature & Fiction
Mystery & Detective
Nonfiction
Professional & Technology
Reference
Religion
Romance
Science
Science Fiction & Fantasy
Sports & Outdoors
Travel & Geography
   Book Info

enlarge picture

Servants, Sirdars and Settlers: Indians in Mauritius, 1834-1874  
Author: Marina Carter (Editor)
ISBN: 0195632966
Format: Handover
Publish Date: June, 2005
 
     
     
   Book Review


Book Description
This is an account of Indian indentured labor in Mauritius over a period of forty years and is an important contribution to the study of labor migration. Marina Carter uses mortality and return statistics, along with other records and documents, to challenge dominant interpretations of the subject.




Servants, Sirdars and Settlers: Indians in Mauritius, 1834-1874

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Servants, Sirdars and Settlers: Indians in Mauritius, 1834-1874 is an account of Indian indentured labour in Mauritius over a period of forty years and is an important contribution to the study of labour migration. The book challenges the dominant interpretations of the indentured labour system, which are sharply divided, viewing the system as either a 'new form of slavery' or a 'release' from domestic oppression. Marina Carter moves away from both of these extreme positions and carefully differentiates the concepts of slavery and indenture. Breaking new ground by using immigration office statistics which describe life-events of Indians in Mauritius, she analyses death and return rates of men, women and children during and post indenture, and traces the marriage patterns of first generation immigrants. The author thus provides glimpses of a world of indenture where immigrants are not merely passive players in a colonial drama. She charts the interactions of the indentured servants with their sirdars and the transformation of part of the community into permanent settlers. Marina Carter establishes that returning labourers played an increasingly significant part in labour mobilization and describes how sirdars became the sociocultural leaders of the immigrant Indians during the time of early village settlements in Mauritius. Several hundred thousand Indians entered as immigrants during 1834-74 and later settled permanently on the island to become the largest community in a multi-ethnic state.

     



Home | Private Policy | Contact Us
@copyright 2001-2005 ReadingBee.com