Review Article: We Mark Your Memory: Writings from the Descendants of Indenture (2018)

Writing the history of indentured diaspora primarily depends on the available archives that contain the official and personal documents related to this history. While the State archives contain scanty materials for research in this area, considerable efforts have been made by the descendants of the indentured labourers to retrieve personal narratives of their ancestors. Retrieving these personal narratives, have indeed, played a major role in creating small family archives, which have inspired the present generation of authors/researchers to document the history of indentured diaspora. Indeed, this history is the outcome of intensive research on the genealogies of the descendants of indentured labourers. Stories narrated by the indentured labourers, old photographs, diary writings, travel documents and such other records are significant archival materials based on which the present generation of authors/researchers trace their family’s past as well as that of the community. These family archives provide considerable resource for research on history of indentured diaspora. It is in the context of this background that the anthology, We Mark Your Memory: Writings from the Descendants of Indenture (2018) edited by David Dabydeen, Maria del Pilar Kaladeen and Tina K. Ramnarine may be considered as a worthy contribution to the history of indenture diaspora. This anthology, which the editors of the book claim to be a “commemorative volume” (Dabydeen, Kaladeen, & Ramnarine, 2018, p. xii), is an attempt to collate the creative/critical pieces written by the descendants of indentured labourers (coolies). Production of such an anthology to mark the centenary year of the abolition of indentureship (1917) is a praiseworthy initiative. The publication of this book is the outcome of a collaborative venture between the School of Advanced Studies, University of London and the association of Commonwealth Writers, which inevitably foregrounds the active global network of almost thirty writers from various regions of the world working seriously on this project of retrieving the lost indentured narratives. The editors of the book acknowledge the genuine contribution of the association of Commonwealth Writers, which is “the cultural initiative of the Commonwealth Foundation” and this association, the editors claim, “inspires and connects writers and storytellers across the world, bringing personal stories to a global audience” (Dabydeen et al., 2018, p. vii). The pronoun ‘we’ of the title of this book represents the storytellers of the present generation, while the determiner ‘your’, mentioned in the title, refers to the coolies, the ancestors of these storytellers. The book therefore is indicative of academic activism that seeks to highlight the significance of reading, researching and discussing these personal narratives in the context of indenture diaspora

Slavery fiction in Britain

This article analyses significant examples of slavery fiction published in Britain by writers who have family links to Africa and the Caribbean. As children of immigrants who had come to Britain after World War II, Caryl Phillips, David Dabydeen, Fred D’Aguiar, Andrea Levy and Bernardine Evaristo shared the uncertainties of coming of age in a society that offered no space for their identities as individuals with roots in other continents. This article reviews some of their fictions and considers them as a group in their re-creation of British involvement in the slave trade and slavery. They refocus the lens of history and present the perspectives of African enslaved and free individuals in stories of human suffering but also of agency and resistance. These fictions reconstruct the role of slavery in the British past as they write against traditional abolition-oriented narratives of the nation.

Living Cargo

Living Cargo offers a wide-ranging study of contemporary literatures, films, visual arts and performances by writers and artists who live and work in the UK but who also maintain strong ties to postcolonial Africa and the Caribbean. Grounded and theoretically nuanced, the book considers how contemporary black British writers and artists engage with the long history of European colonization, in particular the colonial archive, to reframe the dominant narratives of multi-cultural Britain that emerged in the post-war era. Surveying a wide range of contemporary literary, visual, and performance-based creative work, the book looks from works of fiction by Fred D’Aguiar, David Dabydeen, Bernardine Evaristo, Caryl Phillips, and Dorothea Smartt; works of film and video by Inge Blackman and Isaac Julien; and public art and gallery installations by Yinka Shonibare, Graham Mortimer Evelyn, and Hew Locke; to the bespoke style of fashion icon Ozwald Boateng.