The Sun Never Sets

Presented by the Asian/Pacific/American Studies Program in the Department of Social & Cultural Analysis

The Sun Never Sets collects the work of a generation of scholars who are enacting a shift in the orientation of the field of South Asian American studies. By focusing upon the lives, work, and activism of specific, often unacknowledged, migrant populations, the contributors present a more comprehensive vision of the South Asian presence in the United States.

Tracking the changes in global power that have influenced the paths and experiences of migrants, from expatriate Indian maritime workers at the turn of the century, to Indian nurses during the Cold War, to post-9/11 detainees and deportees caught in the crossfire of the “War on Terror,” these essays reveal how the South Asian diaspora has been shaped by the contours of US imperialism. Driven by a shared sense of responsibility among the contributing scholars to alter the profile of South Asian migrants in the American public imagination, they address the key issues that impact these migrants in the US, on the subcontinent, and in circuits of the transnational economy. Taken together, these essays provide tools with which to understand the contemporary political and economic conjuncture and the place of South Asian migrants within it.

Co-sponsored by the Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU.

Vivek Bald is a documentary filmmaker and scholar whose work focuses on histories of the South Asian diaspora. His current project traces the lives of South Asian Muslim silk peddlers and merchant seamen who settled within communities of color in the U.S. South, Northeast, and Midwest in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It is the basis for a forthcoming book, Bengali Harlem and the Lost Histories of South Asian America (Harvard University Press, 2013), and a documentary film, In Search of Bengali Harlem.

 
Miabi Chatterji is the Co-Director of Grantmaking at the RESIST Foundation in Somerville, Massachusetts. She is also a writer, editor, and non-profit consultant. Chatterji received her PhD from NYU in American Studies.

Manu Vimalassery is a Visiting Assistant Professor in American Studies at Williams College. His manuscript, Skew Tracks: Imperialism, Racial Capitalism, and the Transcontinental Railroad, rethinks capitalism through Plains Indian and Chinese migrant histories.

Sujani Reddy is Five College Assistant Professor of Asian/Pacific/American Studies in the American Studies Department at Amherst College.  She is also the co-chair of the Five College Asian/Pacific/American Studies Certificate Program.