Atlantic Gandhi: The Mahatma Overseas

This book shows how transnational, planetary forces from the Caribbean, South Africa and India were brought to bear on Gandhi’s concept of Indianness. Using the frames of diaspora theory, post-colonial discourse theory and the recent Atlantic turn in studies of resistance, it brings into relief Gandhi’s experience as a traveler moving from a classic colony, India, to the plantation and mining society of South Africa.

It puts forward the argument that this move between different modes of production brought Gandhi into contact with indentured labourers, with whom he shared exilic and diasporic consciousness, and whose difficult yet resilient lives inspired his philosophy. It reads Gandhi’s nationalistic sentiments as born in diasporic exile, where he formed his perspective as provincial subject in a multiracial plantation.