A History of the Present : A Biography of Indian South Africans, 1990-2019

A History of the Present is the first full-length study of the Indian minority in South African-a culturally, economically and politically conspicuous and significant population-in the post-apartheid period. Based on original oral and archival material, it focuses on gender, work, religion, sports, the new elites, and racial politics. While focusing on Indian South Africans, this study makes an intervention into key political issues in contemporary South Africa, especially the debate over affirmative action, Black Economic Empowerment, and race and identity, as well as wider intellectual issues like nation, state, and citizenship.

A History of the Present is the first book-length overview of Indian South Africans in the quarter century following the end of apartheid. Based on oral interviews and archival research it threads a narrative of the lives of Indian South Africans that ranges from the working class men and women to the heady heights of the newly minted billionaires; the changes wrought in the fields of religion and gender; opportunities offered on the sporting fields; the search for roots producing local histories that tell of nostalgia, longing and identity; and the links with India and a myriad of transnational organisations. Indians in South Africa appear to be always caught in an infernal contradiction; too traditional, too insular, never fitting in, while also too modern, too mobile. Can we speak of an Indian ''diaspora'' in relation to a people divided by migratory experiences, region, religion, language, ethnicity, caste, and economic status? While focusing on Indian South Africans, this study makes critical interventions into several charged political discussions in post-apartheid South Africa, especially the debate over race and identity, while also engaging in discussions of wider intellectual interest, including diaspora, nation, citizenship and race.