Transnational Spaces of India and Australia

Transnational movements are more intricate than diasporic conflicts of ‘home and away’. They operate not only as international connections but also transect and disturb national formations. What are the spaces (both physical and temporal) in and around which transnational exchanges occur? Much discussion of the transnational focuses on international movements of law, politics and economics as they relate to Europe and the Americas. This book extends the focus to dynamics across the humanities and social sciences and concentrates on the historical and now growing interactions between India and Australia. Studies come from scholars in both countries, who combine academic depth for students and researchers and writing that is clear and engaging for the general reader.

“The volume emanating from India is truly interdisciplinary, scholarly and showcases varied and emerging interests in Australian Studies, unlike most previous works that tended to focus more on literary studies and were majorly the outcome of conferences held in India. The contributors range from stalwarts who have spent a lifetime researching and building the discipline and contributing to its growth and development in India to doctoral candidates who have a burgeoning interest in the area and whose research interests add to the value and growth of varied and newer interests. The editors’ curation extends to creation of new fields of interest in the ‘transnational’ spaces between the two nations and points to the immense possibilities that lie ahead for future growth of the discipline that could extend beyond the academic and be more encompassing.” 

—Professor Santosh Sareen, JNU, New Delhi, India

“This collection presents one of the strongest and most innovative collections of essays I have read in the field of Australian and Indian Studies. It is a contemporary approach to Australian/Indian Studies that supersedes earlier frameworks of colonisation and empire, and national traditions. Now this field has been transformed and mobilised by thinking on the scale of world, globe, environment, and networks. Chapters are surprising and original in their approach to Australian/Indian connections, ranging across museum and heritage studies, film studies, environmental activism and indigenous rights, aged care, political representation by migrants, literature, the market in international students, and media representations of transnational surrogacy and adoption.”

—Professor Emerita Gillian Whitlock FAHA, The University of Queensland, Australia

Professor Deb Narayan Bandyopadhyay is Secretary of the Indian Association for Studies of Australia, Eastern Branch and Vice Chancellor of Bankura University, West Bengal, India. He has edited several collections of studies of Indian-Australia literary and historical links. 

Dr Paul Sharrad is University Fellow at the University of Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia. He has published widely on postcolonial literatures, with specialisations in writing from India, Australia and the Pacific.