CONTENTS
Anglo Indians and the Problem of Marginality
By Catherina Moss
The Anglo-Indians as a mixed-race identity in Australia
By Sheila Pais James
Where have all the Indo-Armenians gone?
By Lionel Caplan
Book Review:
RAJ DAYS TO DOWNUNDER: A Compelling Collection of Anglo-Indian Oral Histories
By Kathleen Cassity
EDITORIAL
This is the (slightly delayed) second issue for 2012. A new writer and old ones and new topics and building on old ones are always welcome and are found in this issue. Emerging Anglo-Indian writers in different disciplines will find the IJAIS has a good number of articles for them.
All the articles within this issue have a view on formations of identity of Anglo-Indians, working on the trope of ‘belonging’ or not. Some assert that Anglo-Indians do not have just one view of themselves. Whatever the stereotypes, they are making ‘their own subjectivity’.
Within Anglo-Indian society, situated in many areas, the heavy dependence on colonial themes to construct identity has given way to another perspective on contemporary identities in the post-colonial present.
The historical nature of how Anglo-Indians are ‘marginalized’ by attitudes that seek to exclude, is still being worked out. In different locations, west or east, anxieties about waning dominance of those considering themselves the norm , finds expression in marginalizing ‘othered’ groups. “Anglo-Indian national identity is governed by constructions of the dominant white, Anglo-Celtic culture prevalent in contemporary multicultural society,” as one writer puts it. No ‘pure’ races exist to speak of, but the myth is carried out when perceptions of threat to ‘existence’ becomes a way to edge out ‘usurpers’. The politics of identity is given consideration and has been in the foreground of many Anglo-Indian thinkers....in the Indian homeland it is ‘exclusion’ from caste and therefore marginalization. And in the land made home, it is yet another form of exclusion from ‘white’ society. What is outlined by writers about ‘not being like us’ in a ‘multicultural society’ has occurred in other white-dominated countries in Europe, in the US, as well as in Australia. ‘White studies’ has became a new way of understanding identity, racism etc in the context of white dominated society and their relationship to smaller communities.
That Anglo-Indians exist in an inclusive society is emphasized in the, surely, first look at the Armenian and Anglo-Indian connection. The early phase of Armenian migration to India, and the progress, or problems of the community, gleaned from Indo-Armenian texts, is explored well in this article and could be a valuable new area of study. The concluding sentence of this introductory study is an invitation to exploration of this subject.
A book review of Dorothy McMenamin’s oral-history project Raj Days to Downunder, has again touched on the repeating idea of diversity, and that Anglo-Indian society is not homogenous as its author asserts. At the risk of being repetitive, diversity is an acceptable fact in Anglo-Indian worlds and the review points out how well the assertions in the text are supported by many photographs in the book. The same idea of plurality is expressed by many Anglo-Indian scholars and can be found in the articles available here.
The valuable focus on self-publishing in the review is timely and encouraging. Many Anglo-Indian works are being self-published. Whether this is the intention or not, it avoids the tired formulas that accompany mainstream publishing of smaller communities. Self-publishing has become a popular means by which various types of autobiographies, fiction, non-fiction, and scholarly works by members of the Anglo-Indian community - in the diaspora, as well as in the old homeland, India - and enables the things they want to say about themselves and others, without being subjected to stereotyping, slander, and abuse.
A Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year to all.
Susan Dhavle
susanddhavle@gmail.com