This article surveys the South Asian communities in Australia, Canada, Aotearoa New Zealand, and South Africa, between the 1900s and 1940s. Specifically, it explores in each case study, whether South Asian migrants used the rhetoric of being British subjects. In addition, the article also considers whether the experience of living in predominantly majority white countries at the time encouraged South Asian communities, of different ethnicities, cultures, and faiths, to create a pan-South Asian identity. It shows that South Asian migrants in Australia, Canada, Aotearoa New Zealand, and South Africa did indeed use the rhetoric of their status as British subjects. However, this began to shift in South Africa from the 1930s onwards. This was primarily because this status had not done very much to protect South Asians in South Africa against increasing restrictions upon their lives by the white dominated Union governments and even the establishment of the beginnings of segregation. The fact that the South Asian community there was also the longest established, meant South African born South Asians also did not have an affinity with their parents’ British Indian subject status. Living in predominantly white majority countries did also generally lead to the creation of a pan-South Asian identity amongst the South Asian communities in Australia, Canada, Aotearoa New Zealand, and South Africa. Common experiences of discrimination and prejudice encouraged disparate groups to put aside their differences and work together to combat these. This was quite a contrast to the situation in South Asia at the time, especially increasingly in terms of faith.

Key Words:

Transnational, Identities, Global, South Asian Diaspora

Article