Faculty Profile

• M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D. from Centre for Historical Studies, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi
• Dr Amit Kumar Mishra earned the doctoral degree from Centre for Historical Studies, JNU on Indian labour diaspora in Mauritius.

• Assistant Professor, Centre for Study of Indian Diaspora, University of Hyderabad, Hyderabad January 2008- to May 2018
• Fellow, Weatherhead Initiative on Global History, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA (USA) August 2014- June 2015
• Postdoctoral Fellow, South Asian Studies Program, National University of Singapore, Singapore August 2006-December 2007

My research interests include Indian labour diaspora, causes and consequences of labour mobility, histories of labour intermediation, culinary cultures and gustatory negotiations of diasporic Indians, and reading transnational migration from perspectives of state-society. I am finalizing a manuscript on reading the movements of Indian indentured labourers from the perspectives of global history.

• First Chancellor’s Award for excellence in teaching and research, 2013 (Rs One Lakh Research Grant and a Citation)
• Fellow, Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland (2017 onwards)
• Consultant, Truth and Justice Commission, Govt. of Mauritius, Mauritius (2010-11)
• Visiting Fellowship, Fondation Maison des Sciences de l'Homme/ Paris (France) December 2008, December 2009
• Charles Wallace Visiting Fellow for archival research in London and Oxford (September-October 2004)
• Junior Research Fellowship from Indian Council of Historical Research, India
• Associate, Centre for Global Health Histories, University of York, York, UK
• Associate, Centre for Research on Slavery and Indenture, University of Mauritius, Mauritius
• Member, International Advisory Board, Global Girmit Institute, Suva (Fiji) and Canberra (Australia)
• Member, National Advisory Committee, Centre for Diaspora Studies, Punjabi University, Patiala (2014-19) Nominated by UGC
• Referee, UNESCO Memory of World Register for inscription of Indentured Immigration Records, Mauritius, nominated by Ministry of Arts and Culture, Govt. of Mauritius, 2012
• Member, Review Committee, Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute, Delhi
• Member, Consultative Committee to set up helpline for Indian diasporic students, MHRD, Govt.of India, 2012
• Official Nominee of Indian government (Ministry of Culture) in SAARC Cultural Centre, Colombo, Sri Lanka Meeting on South Asian Diaspora, March 2012
• Member, Editorial Board, Omnes: Journal of Migration and Society, Seoul (2009-13)
• Member, Editorial Board, Journal of Society and Social Change, Durban, South Africa (2012 onwards)
• Member, Editorial Board, Man in India
• Coordinator, Study in India Programme, University of Hyderabad (2009-2014)
• Member, Committee to Setup helpline for Indian students abroad, MHRD, Govt. of India, 2012
• Referee, Reviewer: Sage, Orient Blackswan, OUP, Research Proposals of ICHR; Journal of Historical Sociology, Studies in History, Gastronomica, Journal of Development Studies, South Asia

Books

• ‘Bonded Self, National Disgrace and Human Misery: Indian Nationalists and Campaign for Abolition of Indentured Labour Emigration’, Monograph, University of Mauritius Press, Mauritius, 2017, ISBN 978-99903-73-44-8
• ‘Mauritius’; Monograph in Afro-Asian Series of National Book Trust of India, New Delhi, 2009 ISBN 978-81-237-5432-1 (book is translated into Oriya and Hindi languages)
• ‘Survivors of Servitude: Indian Labour Diaspora in Mauritius, 1834-1940s’, SAGE (Forthcoming)

Articles and Book Chapters

• ‘Global Histories of Migration(s)’ chapter in Beckert, Sven and Dominic Sachsenmaier eds. Global History; Globally, Bloomsbury London 2018, ISBN 978-1-35003-635-2
• ‘Sikhs in Singapore’, chapter in Jacobsen, Knut A., Gurinder Singh Mann and Kristina Myrvold eds. Encyclopaedia of Sikkhism, Vol.1, Brill, Leiden, 2017, ISBN 978-90-04-29745-6
• ‘Diaspora, Development and Indian State’ article in The Round Table: The Commonwealth Journal of International Affairs (Routledge) November 2016 ISSN 0035-8533 (print) 1474-029X (online)
• ‘Sirdars, Kanganies and Maistries: Intermediaries in Indian Labour Diaspora’ chapter in Wadauer, Sigrid (ed.) History of Labour Intermediation, Berghahn, Oxford, New York, 2015 ISBN 978-1-78238-550-9
• ‘State Policies and the Indian Diaspora in Malaysia’ chapter in Jayaram, N. (ed.) Diversities in the Indian Diaspora: Nature, Implications, Responses, Oxford University Press, Delhi, 2011 ISBN 978-0-19-807146-4
• ‘Indian Indentured Labourers in Mauritius: Reassessing the New System of Slavery vs Free Labour Debate’, Article in Studies in History, Sage, London and New Delhi, December 2009 ISSN 0257-6430 (print) 0973-080X (online)
• ‘Indian Labour Diaspora; Issues and Experiences’, Article, Journal of Mauritian Studies, Mauritius, November 2004 ISBN 978-99903-3-977-2

Reports: (refereed)

• Social and Economic Condition of Descendants of Indentured Labourers in Mauritius, Report, Vol. 3, Truth and Justice Commission, Govt. of Mauritius, 2011 pp. 332-337, ISBN 978-99903-1-025-2
• Overview of Vagrancy Laws in Mauritius, Report, Vol. 4, Truth and Justice Commission, Govt. of Mauritius, 2011 pp. 201-211, ISBN 978-99903-1-025- 2
• Regulation of Indian Marriages in Mauritius, Report, Vol. 4, Truth and Justice Commission, Govt. of Mauritius, 2011 pp. 212-225, ISBN 978-99903-1-025- 2 (co-authored with Pamela Sooben)
• Education and Mobility, Report, Vol. 4, Truth and Justice Commission, Govt. of Mauritius, 2011 pp. 259-272, ISBN 978-99903-1-025-2

• Foreword (detailed introduction) to Report on the Condition of Indian Immigrants in Mauritius, JWP Muir-Mackenzie (1895), University of Mauritius Press, Mauritius, 2017, ISBN 978-99903-73-43-1
• ‘Home and Away’ invited write up in Times Higher Education 2015 ISBN: 978- 93-84038-27-4
• ‘Cultural Continuum of Indians in Diaspora’, Conference Proceeding, International Conference on Diasporic Cultures of South Asia During 18th and 19th Centuries, SAARC Cultural Centre, Colombo ISBN 978-955-0567-05-8

Keynotes, Invited Lectures

• Keynote, ‘Ending Indenture: Regime, Resistance, Remains’, International Conference on Abolition of Indenture in Global Perspective, International Centre for Research on Slavery and Indenture, University of Mauritius, 28-30 September 2017
• Invited Talk ‘Survivors of Servitude: Mapping Trajectories of Transformation in Indian Diaspora in Mauritius’ organised by the Centre for South Asian and Indian Ocean Studies, Tufts University, Medford, USA on 8 April 2015
• Seminar Presentation ‘Indentured Indian Labour Regimes: Situating Peripheral Labour in Global Historical Context’ Weatherhead Initiative on Global History, Harvard University, Cambridge, USA on 23 February 2015
• Keynote, International Workshop on Diaspora, Development and Civic Engagement, NWO-WOTRO sponsored workshop, 25-27 January 2014, Hyderabad
• Public Lecture ‘Wished to Remain Continuous: Cultural Continuum in Old Indian Diaspora’ 16 June 2013, Organised by the Swedish South Asian Studies Network (SASNET) and Lund University, Sweden.
• Invited Talk ‘From Rainbow to Reality: Mauritian Miracle of Managing Cultural Diversity and Truth and Justice Commission’ on 29 April 2013 organised by the Department of Religious Studies and Diversity Program, Hamilton College, Clinton, New York, USA.
• Myron Weiner seminar, ‘Beyond the Rhetoric of remittances: Diaspora, Development and the Indian State’, 24 April 2013 at Inter-University Committee on International Migration, Centre for International Studies, MIT, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.
• Lecture ‘Empire, Nation and Diaspora’ on 15th February 2011 organised by the University of Mauritius, Reduit, Mauritius.
• Keynote Address, International Conference ‘Migration and Settlement in South West Indian Ocean: Shifting Paradigms’, 10-12 Nov. 2010, Mahatma Gandhi Institute, Mauritius
• ‘Trajectories of Diasporic Transformation: Indian Diaspora in Malaysia, Mauritius and Fiji’, invited talk on 27 May 2009 at Mahatma Gandhi Institute, Mauritius.
• ‘Beneficiaries of Empire? Mapping the Transformation of Indian Labour Diaspora in Mauritius’ presentation at the South Asian Studies Programme, National University of Singapore, Singapore on 29th August 2007.
• ‘We Recognise Our Obligation; Indian Nationalists and the Indian Labour Diaspora’, invited talk at the Department of History, University of Sussex, Brighton (UK) on 6th October, 2004.
• ‘Studying Indian Labour Diaspora; Issues and Experiences’, invited talk at the Mahatma Gandhi Institute, Mauritius on 31st May, 2004.
• ‘Archival Sources for Studying Indian Labour Diaspora’, invited talk at the Mahatma Gandhi Institute, organised by the Aapravasi Ghat Trust, Mauritius on 21st May, 2004.

Conference Presentations

• ‘Managed Mobilities, Imperial Durabilities: Indian Labour Diaspora beyond the Confines of Indentured Labour Regime’ in International Conference on Legacy of Slavery and Indentured Labour: Linking the Past with Future, 18- 23 June 2018, University of Suriname, Paramaribo, Suriname (forthcoming)
• ‘Dreams of Cows, Realities in Chains: Transformation from Bondage to Freedom in Indian Labour Diaspora’ in International Workshop on ‘Freedom, Bondage, Future and Selves in Central Asia, Middle East and Africa’ 17-18 September 2015, University Milan-Bicocca, Milan, Italy.
• ‘Indian Indentured Labourers in Indian Ocean’ in International conference ‘Towards the Establishment of the Indentured Labour Route’ 3-5 November 2014, Aapravasi Ghat Trust Fund, Port Louis, Mauritius.
• ‘Indian Sikhs in Singapore to Singaporean Sikhs: Dialectics and Dialogic of Identity Formation among Young Sikhs in Singapore’, in International conference ‘Young Sikhs in Global World: Negotiating Identity, Tradition and Authority’, 18-19 June 2013 organised by Centre for Theology and Religious Studies, Lund University, Sweden.
• ‘Subtexts of Servitude: Indentured Indian Labour Regime in British Plantation Colonies’ in an international conference on Global History of Agrarian Labour Regimes 1750-2000, 25-27 April 2013, organised by the Weatherhead Initiative on Global History, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.
• ‘Diaspora, Development and Indian State’ in an International Conference ‘India-China: Comparing the Paths of Development’ December 10-12, 2012 organised by the School of Social and Behavioural Sciences, University Malaya, Selangor, Malaysia.
• Presented a paper, as the official nominee of government of India, titled ‘The Cultural Continuum of Indian Diaspora: Issues and Experiences’ in the international conference ‘Circulation of Cultures and Cultures of Circulation in South Asia’ in Galle, Sri Lanka, 15-18 March 2012, organised by SAARC Cultural Centre, Colombo, Sri Lanka.
• Resource Person and Speaker, International Workshop on Labour Intermediation, 27-28 November 2009, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria.
• ‘Intermediaries in Indian Labour Diaspora’ presented in International roundtable on Intermediaries in Global Labour Relations, 5 December 2008, organised by the Free University, Brussels, Belgium.
• ‘Mapping the Transformation of Indian Diaspora in Mauritius and Making of a Multicultural Society’ presented in international seminar ‘The Indian Ocean: the largest cultural continuum in the world’, organised by the Zanzibar Indian Ocean Research Institute, Zanzibar from 15th to 17th August 2008.
• ‘Subtexts of Servitude: Anti-Vagrancy Laws and Mobility of Indian Indentured Labourers’ paper presented in an international conference organised by National Centre for Scientific Research and Maison des Sciences de l’ Homme, Paris (France) on 28th September 2007.
• ‘Indian Indentured Labourers in Plantation Colonies: The New System of Slavery vs Free Labour Debate’, paper presented in international conference on ‘Global Labour History and the Question of Freedom and Unfreedom’, organised by the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, (Institute for Advanced Study) Berlin (Germany), 16th to 18th December 2006.

In India

Conference, Seminars, Workshops

• ‘Imperial Liberalism, Noblesse Oblige and Indian Labour Diaspora in 19th Century’ paper in an International Workshop on ‘Reconsideration of 19th Century from Asian Perspective’, 7th-8th January 2016, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
• ‘Diaspora, Development and Indian State’, paper in an international conference on ‘Patterns of Social and Economic Change in Colonial and Independent India’ , JNU, New Delhi 21-22 December 2013.
• Resource Person, workshop on ‘Migration of Highly Skilled Indians to Netherlands and Notions of Citizenship and Civic Engagement’, organised by the South Asia desk of International Institute of Social History and Dr Ellen Ball, Free University, Amsterdam in Kolkata, 11-12 February 2013.
• ‘Historiography of Indian Labour Diaspora’ in an international conference ‘Historiographical Engagements in India: A Symposium in Honour of Prof R S Sharma’, organised by the Centre for Historical Studies, JNU, New Delhi, 27th to 29th January 2012.
• ‘Role of Intermediaries in the Overseas Labour Migration’, paper presented in national seminar on People on Move: Internal and External Migrations in South India, Osmania University, Hyderabad, 26-27 August 2011.
• ‘Indian Diaspora in Mauritius and Fiji: Comparative Perspectives’ paper presented in international conference Indentured Migration: History, Memory and Popular Culture, 28th and 29th November, 2010, GB Pant Institute, Allahabad and Govt. of Surinam.
• ‘Wording the Diasporic World: Representations of Indian Diaspora’ plenary paper in an international conference on Literatures of Indian Diaspora, RMNL University, Faizabad, 10th - 11th January 2010
• ‘State Policies and Indian Diaspora in Malaysia’ paper presented in international seminar on ‘Diversities in Indian Diaspora’, organised by the Indian Institute of Advanced Studies (Shimla) and Institute for Social and Economic Change (Bangalore), 7th to 9th May 2008.
• ‘Gandhi and Girmitiyas’ paper presented in an international seminar organised by the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, New Delhi on 31st January and 1st February 2008.
• ‘Indian Diaspora in Mauritius’ paper presented in international conference on ‘Writing Twentieth Century History: From Colony to Nation’, organised by Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University (New Delhi), 27th to 29th March, 2006.

Invited Talks

• ‘Indians in Diaspora’, Centre for Comparative Literature, University of Hyderabad, 12 February 2016
• ‘Are We All Really Multiculturalist Now? Multiculturalism and Its Limitations in Contemporary Context’, HRDC, Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad, 11 January 2016
• ‘Multiculturalism, Diasporic Identity and Émigré Nationalism: Indians in US’ HRDC, Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad, 11 January 2016
• ‘Historiographies of Indian Indentured Diaspora’, HRDC, JNU, New Delhi, 8 January 2016
• ‘Wording the Diasporic World: Literature of Indian Diaspora’ , Academic Staff College, Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad, 12 January 2015
• ‘Representing Indians in Diaspora’ SN School of Arts and Communication, University of Hyderabad, 21 October 2013
• ‘Indians in Diaspora: Issues and Experiences’, SN School of Arts and Communication, University of Hyderabad, 22 October 2012
• ‘Representations of Indian Diaspora’, Centre for Comparative Literature, University of Hyderabad, 5 September 2012
• ‘Empire and Migration’ invited talk at Academic Staff College, University of Hyderabad, Hyderabad on 27th February 2008
• ‘Indian Diaspora in South East Asia’ ‘Indian Diaspora in South East Asia’ invited talk to the university and college teachers at UGC Academic Staff College, SV University, Tirupati, India on 25 February, 2008