(Re)visioning Coolie Women in British Malaya

This event will be a conversation between Professors Jessica Hinchy and Tapsi Mathur of NTU History with Dr. Arunima Datta, author of the new book, Fleeting Agencies: A Social History of Indian Coolie Women in British Malaya. With this book, Dr. Datta disrupts male-dominated narratives of migration by focusing on its gendered patterns and shows how South Asian women labor migrants engaged with the process of migration, interacted with other migrants, and negotiated colonial laws. Dr. Datta is breaking new ground as she does so, this being the first study of Indian coolie women in British Malaya.

About the Speaker:

Arunima Datta is an Assistant Professor in the Department of History, Idaho State University. Dr. Datta is a scholar in the fields of South and Southeast Asian history, British imperialism, and transnational history. She has published her work in the Journal of Historical Geography, Journal of Victorian Culture, Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History, Journal of Women’s History Review, Journal of Malaysian Branch of Royal Asiatic Society, and she has forthcoming articles in the journals of Labour History and Indian Journal of Gender Studies. Dr. Datta serves on the editorial boards of several leading academic journals. She is the book review editor for Gender and History, and she was recently appointed as the Associate Editor of Britain and the World.