Imagining Home and Community in East African Asian Writings

This book interrogates the way two leading East African Asian writers imagine homes and community within the trajectory of post-colonial and cultural studies. Focusing on Moyez Vassanji and Yusuf Dawood, it argues for particularity as an important point in understanding the uniqueness of South Asian immigrants in East Africa. Contrary to the general association of immigrancy with marginality, this book suggests a fluidity that occasionally allows immigrant communities to dominate some aspects of life of their countries of settlement, exemplified by the economic dominance that East African Asians enjoy. Their touch with histories of the region, contemporary geopolitics and the thinning of boundaries have all allowed East African Asians occasion to formulate multiple consciousness in the construction of their identities. Key aspects that concern the author include the construction of Characters, the idea of journeys and baggage, as well as the quest for homes and homeliness by immigrant communities in the context of dynamic politics of nation-formation. Ultimately, the author sees works of Vassanji and Dawood as significantly enriching our understanding of the Indian Ocean Worlds.