Call for Papers for Peer-Reviewed Edited Volume :

African (ess/ity) in India; (re)presentation, perception and image

Over the last few years, the growing African communities in India have been in the spotlights following a series of incidents. Local and international media have reported on a number of cases of alleged (and proven) harassment, assault, discrimination, negative stereotyping, and racism towards Africans in India.  Early November 2013, a Nigerian national was murdered in Passa in Goa sparking violent reactions among the Nigerians. In the same year, in July, a Chadian national was assaulted in broad daylight by a mob in Bangalore. More recently, on January 15, 2014 in New Delhi, the then Law Minister Somnath Bharti (of Aam Aadmi Party) was accused of heading a midnight raid with a group of supporters against Nigerian and Ugandian women living in Khirki (Delhi) on grounds that they were running a drug and prostitution racket. The women were allegedly made to undergo drug tests and cavity searches which turned out to be negative. Subsequently, a First Information Report (FIR) –a charge sheet – was filed with the police against him for alleged molestation, racial abuse, hurt and trespassing. This last incident further stoked controversies and debates over racism towards Africans in India.

This situation above all calls into question the need to investigate and understand the (re)presentation, perception and image of Africaness (ity) and the African communities in India beyond news and media headlines. We seek to critically examine  the ways in which images, stereotypes and perceptions construct Africans as the ‘others’ in India and how these (might) influence the ways Africans are (re)presented, perceived  and imagined by Indians at large. The book will critically question whether the experience of the African communities in India is constitutive of living in such a complex and diverse religious, racial, cultural and linguistic society.

We invite original cross-disciplinary contributions that critically, even polemically, foster research and reflection ideas on Africaness (ity) in India and the (re)presentation, perception and image of Africa (ans) in India. Questions that are of particular interest include (but are not limited to) the following:

• Social and cultural representation (including popular culture)(Re)presentation, perception and image in Indian literatures
• (Re)presentation, perception and image in Indian cinema and music
• (Re)presentation, perception and image in sports and arts
• (Re)presentation, perception and image in education: school curriculum and textbooks
• (Re)presentation perception and image in academic disciplines: language studies, sociology, literature, Cultural studies, etc.
• Recent migration
• ‘Othering’ the Africans
• Shared post-colonial legacies

Schedule for submission of papers:

Abstracts must be submitted by 30^th June 2015

Review and selection of abstracts by 31^st July 2015

And the final paper by 30^th January 2016

Publication of volume July 2016

Editors

Kusum Aggarwal, University of Delhi

Kusumaggarwal@gmail.com

Ibrahima Diallo, University of South Australia

Ibrahima.diallo@unisa.edu.au

---

---