Confronting colonial legacies

Between 1834 and the end of the first world war, Britain transported more than two million Indians to work in its colonies worldwide, from Trinidad to Kenya, in return for payment, land and eventual return home. However, it rarely fulfilled these promises, leaving these indentured workers in poverty far from home. The British Government officially abolished the practice in 1917, but its legacy lives on for these workers' descendants, who still face marginalisation, discrimination and racism. Dr Geetha Reddy is building solidarities between South African and Malaysian descendent communities to tackle these inequalities.

"Colonial powers such as Britain imposed imperialist values and beliefs across their empires while robbing Indigenous communities of their lands, cultures, languages and wisdom," explains Lecturer in Psychology, Dr Geetha Reddy. "While many have gained some form of independence, the social order and everyday life in former colonies today is underpinned by this coloniality - the legacy of colonialism – which established racial, political, gender and class hierarchies of control, favouring some groups and marginalising others. For the descendants of Indian indentured workers, this plays out in everyday racism and discrimination which deprives them of education, employment and good health."

With the OU Open Societal Challenges programme's support, Dr Reddy and international interdisciplinary research colleagues are undertaking several research projects over a 10-year period to understand how coloniality continues to impact descendants of indentured Indian workers in South Africa and Malaysia. The Building Global South-South Solidarities to Redress Inequalities (BUSSIN) Challenge will bring these communities together to share their varied experiences of marginalisation and reflect on the connections to coloniality. It will also connect them with development agencies and policymakers and support them in developing a road map of concrete transformative collective actions they can take to eradicate inequalities, resist coloniality and improve their lives.

"The political environment and struggles for people racialised as Indian in each country are very different. For example, South Asians in South Africa, considered by themselves and others as politically Black, were part of the movement that ended Apartheid. Their experiences of marginalisation are different to those in Malaysia who continue to experience racism and police brutality," Dr Reddy says. "Still, their shared history and ancestry mean their liberation from marginalisation is tied together. By bringing these communities together in solidarity to share experiences and ideas, we will work together to co-create community-based solutions to their societal challenges."

Dr Reddy‘s background enables them to bring unique insights to the challenge. "As a person who has personal and professional connections to Malaysia and South Africa, and as someone whose grandparents and parents lived under colonial administration, I am motivated to unravel the knotty connections between British colonialism and the psychology of people today in the two countries. At the same time, being an academic from the Global South who now lives and works in the UK, I feel a great responsibility to bring Global North resources to the project without imposing Global North perspectives. Change will only come when the communities are in the driving seat."

The challenge will draw on archive resources and use storytelling, photography and art to help people consider their past and imagine their futures. It is expected to culminate in 2033, with free physical exhibitions of participants' work in South Africa, Malaysia and the UK. Dr Reddy and colleagues will also document various aspects of the challenge and share its findings online.

"In psychology, we tend to use surveys, experiments and interviews to understand racism and discrimination, but as the saying goes, 'a picture is worth a thousand words'," Dr Reddy says. "Many people in these communities have a smartphone, making photography an accessible medium they can use to tell their stories."