Travelling Pasts: The Politics of Cultural Heritage in the Indian Ocean World

Burkhard Schnepel is Professor of Social Anthropology at the Institute for Social Anthropology of the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg in Halle, Germany. One of his more recent books is Connectivity in Motion. Islands Hubs in the Indian Ocean World, co-edited with E.A. Alpers (2018).Tansen Sen is Professor of History and the Director of the Center for Global Asia at NYU Shanghai. His most recent book is entitled India, China, and the World: A Connected History (2017).

"This collection throws ‘light on the issue of “Travelling Pasts” across the Indian Ocean’ (p. 16) by explaining how maritime activity involves considerable complexity, and in doing so contributes to ‘inclusive understanding of maritime cultural heritage cuts across political boundaries’(p. 57). The book underscores how cultural heritage has and continues to be subject to political influence, and that it is still being used for political ends. It remains to be seen what the future holds for heritage governance in the Indian Ocean, with growing populations and mobility of peoples, and increasingly contested spaces and resources. This book will no doubt will be of considerable value to scholars and researchers working in history, heritage, politics, anthropology and many other areas of past and future Indian Ocean." - Erika Techera, UWA Law School and UWA Oceans Institute, The University of Western Australia, in: Journal of the Indian Ocean Region [DOI: 10.1080/19480881.2020.1760603]

• ContentsList of Figures, Maps and TablesNotes on ContributorsTravelling Pasts: An IntroductionBurkhard SchnepelPart 1: Indian Ocean Cultural Heritage and the ‘World’1 Global Linkages, Connectivity and the Indian Ocean in the UNESCO World Heritage ArenaChristoph Brumann2 ‘Project Mausam’. India’s Transnational Initiative: Revisiting UNESCO’s World Heritage ConventionHimanshu Prabha Ray3 The History of the Hajj as Heritage: Asset or Burden to the Saudi State?Ulrike FreitagPart 2: (Im-)materialities on the Move4 Materiality and Mobility: Comparative Notes on Heritagization in the Indian Ocean WorldKatja Müller and Boris Wille5 Ambiguous Pasts: The Indian Ocean World in Cape Town’s Public HistoryNigel WordenPart 3: Travelling Pasts in the Eastern Indian Ocean World6 Temple Heritage of a Chinese Migrant Community: Movement, Connectivity, and Identity in the Maritime WorldTansen Sen7 The Uses of ‘Chinese Heritage’: Foreign Policy of the People’s Republic of China in the Contemporary Indo-Pacific WorldGeoffrey Wade8 Heritage Food: The Materialization of Connectivity in Nyonya CookingMareike PampusPart 4: Travelling Pasts in the Western Indian Ocean World9 Contradictions in the Heritagization of Zanzibar ‘Stone Town’Abdul Sheriff10 The Production of Identities on the Island of Mayotte: A Historical PerspectiveIain WalkerIndex