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An island with no native population, Mauritius was permanently peopled through colonisation as from the early eighteenth century. European colonists, African and Malagasy slaves, Indian contract labourers, Chinese and Indian petty merchants settled on the island and progressively created a society shaped by the diversity of its population and also by the unequal access to limited resources and wealth. Contemporary Mauritius tends to be sensitive to its multiple origins and identity boundaries, as well as to potential conflicts and the importance of interaction and communication in a multicultural society. Common denominators of culture and language, as well as dynamic processes of cultural and linguistic hybridity, that could form the basis of an all-Mauritian culture thus become crucial. This is shown in the studies presented in this volume which are given a wider perspective through comparison with other post-colonial societies such as the French Caribbean.
List of contents
Contents: Ralph Ludwig/Burkhard Schnepel: Some ideas on communication, culture and society in Mauritius: Multiple identities in action - Vinesh Y. Hookoomsing: Mauritius: Creole and/or multicultural? - Kenneth McPherson: Mauritius: Mirror and model of history - Philip Baker: Some of the things that social history and old texts can and cannot tell us about the evolution of creole languages - Annegret Bollée : Le créole mauricien : Un parler de deuxième génération ? - Patrick Eisenlohr: An Indian Ocean "creole island"? Language and the politics of hybridity in Mauritius - Raphaël Confiant : La créolité comme dépassement de l'ethnicité en Martinique et en Guadeloupe - Vinesh Y. Hookoomsing : Regards croisés : La créolité version mauricienne, ou le triomphe du multiculturalisme - Gerry L'Étang : Mutations de l'hindouisme aux Mascareignes et aux Antilles - Frank Donath: Islamic fundamentalism and Western modernity among Muslims in Mauritius - Ralph Ludwig/Fabiola Henri/Florence Bruneau-Ludwig : Hybridation linguistique et fonctions sociales : Aspects des contacts entre créole, français et anglais à Maurice - Sibylle Kriegel/Ralph Ludwig/Fabiola Henri : Les rapports entre créole et bhojpouri à Maurice : Contact de langues et actes identitaires - Carsten Wergin: T'shéga, Shéga, Séga... : Music, identity and creolization on Réunion Island - Burkhard Schnepel/Cornelia Schnepel: The Mauritian Séga : Performing identity in a multi-ethnic setting - Burkhard Schnepel: Two beaches: The globalization of Mauritian waterfronts.
About the author
The Editors: Vinesh Y. Hookoomsing has completed a long career as Professor of Linguistics at the University of Mauritius. His research areas include language, education and culture studies in Creole and plural societies of the Indian Ocean and the Caribbean. His current research interests lie in Mauritian diaspora history and literature.
Ralph Ludwig is Professor of Romance Linguistics at the University of Halle. His main research areas are orality studies, francophone and latinamerican language variation, contact linguistics and creole studies, as well as francophone literature. Field work regularly takes him to the Indian Ocean, the Caribbean and South America.
Burkhard Schnepel is Professor of Social Anthropology and Director of the Centre of Oriental Studies at the University of Halle. He has done extensive research on East Africa, East India and recently Mauritius. His current thematic interests lie in the anthropology of tourism and in the ethnohistory of port cities of the Indian Ocean.
