Transnational connections and anti‐colonial radicalism in the Royal Indian Navy mutiny, 1946

In this article, I explore the spatial politics of the Royal Indian Navy mutiny of 1946 and call for a more maritime sense of ‘the political’. The RIN only existed from 1934 to 1950; it became the Indian Navy after independence. Its mutiny in 1946, which was caused by a number of grievances from anticolonial nationalism to more mundane challenges about the standard of food, continues to be the dominant event in this history. Leela Gandhi (2014) used the RIN mutiny to challenge the binary distinction between elite and subaltern in much Indian historiography by depicting it as an ‘anti‐colonial counterpublic’, or space in which discourses other than the dominant nationalist framings of independence were mobilized. She also regards the mutiny as a potential example of inconsequential ethics in which, instead of worrying about its causes, the mutiny can be read as an experimental space in which democratic politics occurred, rather than one in which people were striving for a ‘successful’ outcome. I argue that, while there is much to be admired in Gandhi's reading of these events, she discounts the maritime nature of the RIN mutiny. In other words, she fails to acknowledge that travelling to different international locations allowed the sailors to learn about democracy and other ideas, which in turn influenced their beliefs about what the future of India, and the RIN, should look like. As a result, I argue for the need to explore in greater depth the important connections that exist between anti‐colonialism, democratic politics and the naval/maritime experience.     

Editorial

Abstract

Two language textbooks written in 17th century New England are examined, John Eliot's The Indian Grammar Begun and Roger Williams' A Key into the Language of America. Previously unnoticed links between these texts and traditional English forms of language teaching are demonstrated, and the argument is made that both men made conscious choices about how to adapt their experience of European linguistic models to the very different grammatical structures of Native American languages. These linguistic choices demonstrate the ways in which English and New English culture of the time used language to construct and display religious, social and national identities, using the contrast between Eliot's and Williams' lives and audiences at the time of writing in order to gain insight into the connections between language and identity in the period.     

American Indians,civilized performance and the question of rights

Abstract

Between the middle of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th, public arguments about the eligibility of American Indians for citizenship, and about the obligations of white Americans toward Indian populations, shifted from a focus on the rights of the Indian minority to a focus on the rights of the white majority. Similarly, discussions of the criteria for Indian citizenship also shifted, from a concern with the moral duty of the majority to ensure the human rights of the minority to a consideration of whether any claims to rights must be respected on moral grounds alone. The writings of Lydia Maria Child and Lyman Abbott on the 'Indian question' illustrate the ways in which Child's paternalistic family model of entitlement is replaced by a later model that emphasizes culture over morality, behavior over rights.     

Tarzan the German-Eater

Abstract

This article raises questions about methodology in the study of transnational popular writing by examining the international popularity of Edgar Rice Burroughs, author of the Tarzan novels. Critical anti-imperialist analyses have found in Burroughs's fiction a dangerous metaphorics supporting imperialistic US foreign policies. In Weimar Germany, resistance to the Tarzan novels emerged that all but eliminated the market for these otherwise internationally popular fictions. Yet the German reaction shows how the idea of 'empire', embodied in tropes of race and gender, could continue to function in debates about international popular literature. At the same time, Burroughs was forced to adapt to international markets by tempering his imperialistic fictions. Burroughs's work after the controversy shows a shift in the depiction of national 'others', yet it had little radical potential because Burroughs had turned his imperial gaze inward, towards the internally colonized: Native Americans.     

Strong or weak ties? British and Indian expatriate scientists finding jobs in Boston

In this article I analyse the different social networks that British and Indian scientists use to obtain job information in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology sector around Boston, Massachusetts. I argue that individuals' social networks are critical in helping highly skilled migrants find jobs. The research finds that British and Indian scientists use both strong and weak ties to obtain jobs and there is no significant difference between senior and junior workers in terms of whether they relied on strong or weak ties. I argue, nonetheless, that the terms strong ties and weak ties are problematic because they are not clearly understood or mutually exclusive.     

Freighting English law: interpreting maritime spaces,law and the Armenian strategies in the Indian Ocean

In this article, I examine the formation of the English East India Company's legal regime in the Indian Ocean between the mid‐eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. I look at how this process affected maritime trade and space from the vantage point of Armenian merchants' interactions with the colonial regime in the courts of law. The productive tensions arising from the colonial regime's new protocols and the merchants' leveraging tactics make for a complex story of Anglo‐Armenian dialogue. I argue that indigenous agency in the colonial courts complicated the binary colonial/indigenous structure. The idea of legal pluralism that emerges from the article suggests that the identity of an imperial subject or the definition of law was neither a given nor simply imposed through colonial coercion but was a complex product of a long‐term dialogue and rationalization.     

A middle‐class global mobility? The working lives of Indian men in a west London hotel

In this article we examine the working lives of young, single, middle‐class Indian men employed in the increasingly global hospitality sector in London, UK. Using a case study of a single hotel, we investigate a particular form of Indian middle‐class global mobility that differs from both the well‐documented ‘low status’, unskilled migrant as well as the highly‐skilled, science oriented migrants. We explore how their jobs both reinforce and challenge middle‐class Indian notions of masculinity, as well as how the recruitment process is both gendered and economically selective. We suggest that the transnational formation of Indian middle‐class identity is drawn from four main categories: a middle‐class lifestyle in India, class‐based motivations, the gendered and class based recruitment process of the UK hospitality industry, and the performance of class‐based gender identities.     

Communicating globalization in Bombay cinema: Everyday life,imagination and the persistence of the local

Abstract

Bollywood films increasingly portray the life-worlds of India's urban middle class and their transnational connections. Characters in the Hindi-language films use English phrases, cell phones and computers, celebrate Valentine's Day and are seen to frequent exercise clubs and shopping malls. The non-resident Indian, or NRI, symbol of the diaspora, is now a fixture in these films, often the hero and portrayed as part of the familial world and social circle of the urban middle classes. This, combined with the way a large portion of the films depict settings outside India, in Switzerland, Mauritius, the UK and North America, have led critics to question the Indian-ness of the films. This article examines the deterritorialized narrative of Bollywood film for its communication of globalization and transnationalism. It argues that Bombay films address broader debates in the study of transnationalism, such as the significance of the local in a postnational world. The films offer insights into the production of locality by communicating a sense of place as feeling rather than representations based solely on geography or territory, so making a case for a topography of affect as meaningful for a phenomenology of globalization.     

American Studies in India: a retrospect

Abstract

This article was prompted by John Muthyala's piece in Comparative American Studies entitled ' "America" in Transit: The Heresies of American Studies Abroad' (2003). However, it is not simply a response; it attempts to plug certain gaps in the earlier article and draw attention to a few factual details essential for a proper understanding of the growth and evolution of American Studies in India. During the years when funds from the US government were in ample supply, the discipline flourished in Indian universities. Following the cessation of fiscal support, it has been languishing, but by no means is it dead: committed scholars continue to work in American Studies and a lot of academic activity still takes place. The present article begins with the historical background and the earliest exchanges between India and the USA; it concludes with reference to the scenario now, in 2004, which may not be too bright but is certainly not without hope.