The University of Cambridge has developed what is believed to be the first ever visiting fellowship into Indentureship Studies, the controversial system that replaced slavery in the British Empire.
Selwyn College has appointed Professor Gaiutra Bahadur as the Ramesh and Leela Narain visiting bye-fellow in Indentureship Studies. Professor Bahadur is the author of Coolie Woman: The Odyssey of Indenture, which was shortlisted for the Orwell Prize. It is a study of the lives of Indian women who became indentured labourers to colonial plantations in the 19th century.
Selwyn College and the Ameena Gafoor Institute – whose director is novelist, poet and academic Professor David Dabydeen – collaborated in setting up the programme which allows a scholar to spend eight weeks at the University, conducting research. The programme will run for an initial five years.
The study of indentureship and its legacies was one of the recommendations made in the report of the Legacies of Enslavement at Cambridge Advisory Group, and it is hoped that enough funding will eventually be raised to establish a permanent Professorship in the subject, based at the University.
Professor Bahadur, who works at Rutgers University–Newark, said: “When I first began doing research in this area, the funding just wasn’t there, so it was in many ways a labour of love. That’s why I’m so happy to see there’s now visibility and funding like this to help future researchers.”
Professor Dabydeen said, “The study and documentation of indentureship is undoubtedly valuable, but it has barely been included in the history syllabi of British and European Universities – a staggering omission considering the millions of individuals, and indeed entire cultures, irrevocably shaped by indentureship and its legacies.”
“Cambridge has created an academic subject, bringing it from the margins to the very centre. I am grateful to the Gafoor family in Guyana for helping to make all this possible,” he added.