Africa In The Indian Ocean

Tor Sellström profiles the independent island states and the European dependencies in the African part of the Indian Ocean, their contemporary social, political and economic challenges, the wider international context and their relations with, in particular, Africa and the African Union.

The history of Africa's historical relationship with the rest of the Indian Ocean world is one of a vibrant exchange that included commodities, people, flora and fauna, ideas, technologies and disease. This connection with the rest of the Indian Ocean world, a macro-region running from Eastern Africa, through the Middle East, South and Southeast Asia to East Asia, was also one heavily influenced by environmental factors. In presenting this rich and varied history, Gwyn Campbell argues that human-environment interaction, more than great men, state formation, or imperial expansion, was the central dynamic in the history of the Indian Ocean world (IOW). Environmental factors, notably the monsoon system of winds and currents, helped lay the basis for the emergence of a sophisticated and durable IOW 'global economy' around 1,500 years before the so-called European 'Voyages of Discovery'. Through his focus on human-environment interaction as the dynamic factor underpinning historical developments, Campbell radically challenges Eurocentric paradigms, and lays the foundations for a new interpretation of IOW history.

Although much has been written about the African Diaspora in the Atlantic Ocean, the Diaspora in the Indian Ocean is virtually unrecognised. Concerned with Africans who lived south of the Sahara and were dispersed by free will or forcefully to the non-African lands in the Indian Ocean region, this book deals with a topic that has been overlooked for too long. Eight scholars researching in distinct geographical areas and with interdisciplinary expertise offer a comprehensive and informative account of the Diaspora in the Indian Ocean.

This volume comprises a selection of essays by scholars from a variety of disciplines that discuss the exchange relationship between Africa and the wider Indian Ocean world (IOW), a macro-region running from East Africa to China, from early times to about 1300 CE. The rationale for regarding this macro-region as a “world” is the central significance of the monsoon system which facilitated the early emergence of long-distance trans-IOW maritime exchange of commodities, peoples, plants, animals, technologies and ideas.

"For centuries, East Africa has played a central role within the Indian Ocean world. The Arabs built the first trade networks there; these were laid siege to by the Portuguese in the sixteenth century, followed by British colonialists in the nineteenth century. An interregional trade linked different subregions of East Africa to other Indian Ocean economies. For example, Hindu merchants from Gujarat played a leading role in the ivory trade of East Africa during the past four centuries. In the nineteenth century, Zanzibar became a major center of the Asian slave trade. While slave trading, slave raiding, and their consequences provide one thematic focus of this book, the author also demonstrates that Indian Ocean commercial networks were much more complex in the range of products exchanged, including luxury goods and staple food items, as well as enforced labor. Islam provided yet another connective tissue linking East Africa to the Indian Ocean world and served as a cultural matrix through which popular beliefs and practices were transmitted. This book offers an eye-opening perspective on an often neglected area of world history."--Publisher's description.

This book examines the presence of Africa as a significant force in the western Indian Ocean. Africa will increasingly play a pivotal role in the future of the geopolitics of the Indian Ocean region. The book considers the scope for greater African involvement in Indian Ocean region-building activities, and seeks to encourage a western Indian Ocean dialogue. The book publishes some of the best papers presented at an Indian Ocean Research Group (IORG Inc.) symposium held in Nairobi, Kenya, in 2013, entitled "The Political Economy of Maritime Africa in the Indian Ocean Region." This symposium was part of a larger project on constructing a sense of "Indian Oceanness". Chapters include: India’s new policy of engagement with Africa; China’s growing presence in the Indian Ocean Region; security strategies in the Western Indian Ocean; the increasing importance and significance of the Western Indian Ocean littoral; and cultural linkages between Africa and the Indian Ocean region. This book was previously published as a special issue of the Journal of the Indian Ocean Region.

Explores the culturally complex and cosmopolitan histories and of islands off the African coast

The abolition of slavery in and around the Western Indian Ocean have been little studied. This collection examines the meaning of slavery and its abolition in relation to specific indigenous societies and to Islam, a religion that embraced the entire region, and draws comparisons between similar developments in the Atlantic system. Case studies include South Africa, Mauritius, Madagascar, the Benadir Coast, Arabia, the Persian Gulf and India. This volume marks an important new development in the study of slavery and its abolition in general, and an original approach to the history of slavery in the Indian Ocean and Asia regions.