Angela Wanhalla

Angela McCarthy

Jacqueline Leckie

In contrast to much scholarship on cross-cultural encounters, which focuses primarily on contact between indigenous peoples and ’settlers’ or ’sojourners’, this book is concerned with migrant aspects of this phenomenon – whether migrant-migrant or migrant-host encounters – bringing together studies from a variety of perspectives on cross-cultural encounters, their past, and their resonances across the contemporary Asia-Pacific region. Organised thematically into sections focusing on ’imperial encounters’ of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, ’identities’ in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, and ’contemporary citizenship’ and the ways in which this is complicated by mobility and cross-cultural encounters, the volume presents studies of New Zealand, Singapore, Australia, Vanuatu, Mauritius and China to highlight key themes of mobility, intimacies, ethnicity and ’race’, heritage and diaspora, through rich evidence such as photographs, census data, the arts and interviews. Demonstrating the importance of multidisciplinary ways of looking at migrant cross-cultural encounters through blending historical and social science methodologies from a range of disciplinary backgrounds, Migrant Cross-Cultural Encounters in Asia and the Pacific will appeal to anthropologists, sociologists, cultural geographers and historians with interests in migration, mobility and cross-cultural encounters.

Migrant Cross-Cultural Encounters in Asia and the Pacific

Between 1921 and 1965 Irish and Scottish migrants continued to seek new homes abroad. Using the personal accounts of these migrants from letters, interviews, questionnaires, and shipboard journals, together with more traditional documentary sources such as immigration files and maritime records, this book examines the experience of migration and settlement in North America and Australasia. Through a close reading of personal testimonies the author highlights the assorted similarities and differences between the Irish and Scots. Subtle differences rather than yawning cultural gaps are apparent; similarities in attitude and expectation are more common than divergent or unique experiences. The key revelation of the work is that, despite a number of peculiarities characterising their individual and collective experiences of migration, both the Irish and Scots were relatively successful migrants in the period under consideration. Using interviews, both spoken and written, and tackling issues of why and how versions of the past are represented and what they mean, this fascinating study considers individual and collective memory and the use of personal testimonies as historical evidence: their uniqueness and typicality. Furthermore, in using personal narratives the book portrays individual migration experiences which are often hidden in studies based on statistical analysis.

'For spirit and adventure'

Personal narratives of Irish and Scottish migration, 1921–65

"Study of individual experiences of migration through personal correspondence of emigrants from Ireland to New Zealand"--Provided by publisher.

'the Desired Haven'

Irish Migrants in New Zealand, 1840-1937

T M Devine

This book brings to life for the first time the remarkable story of James Taylor, ‘father of the Ceylon tea enterprise’ in the nineteenth century. Publicly celebrated in Sri Lanka for his efforts in transforming the country’s economy and shaping the world’s drinking habits, Taylor died in disgrace and remains unknown to the present day in his native Scotland. Using a unique archive of Taylor’s letters written over a forty-year period, Angela McCarthy and Tom Devine provide an unusually detailed reconstruction of a British planter’s life in Asia at the high noon of empire. As well as charting the development of Ceylon’s key commodities in the nineteenth century, the book examines the dark side of planting life including violence and conflict, oppression and despair. A range of other fascinating themes are evocatively examined, including graphic depictions of the Indian Mutiny, ‘race’ and ethnicity, migration, environmental transformation, cross-cultural contact, and emotional ties to home.

James Taylor in Victorian Ceylon

Tea and empire

This international edited book collection of ten original contributions from established and emerging scholars explores aspects of Ireland’s place in the world since the 1780s. It imaginatively blends comparative, transnational, and personal perspectives to examine migration in a range of diverse geographical locations including Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Australia, New Zealand, the United States, Canada, Argentina, Jamaica, and the British Empire more broadly. Deploying diverse sources including letters, interviews, press reports, convict records, and social media, contributors canvas important themes such as slavery, convicts, policing, landlordism, print culture, loyalism, nationalism, sectarianism, politics, and electronic media. A range of perspectives including Catholic and Protestant, men and women, convicts and settlers are included, and the volume is accompanied by a range of striking images.

Comparative, Transnational, and Personal Perspectives

Ireland in the World

T. M. Devine

This pioneering volume focuses on the scale, territorial trajectories, impact, economic relationships, identity and nature of the Scottish-Asia connection from the late seventeenth century to the present. It is especially concerned with identifying whether there was a distinctive Scottish experience and if so, what effect it had on the East. Did Scots bring different skills to Asia and how far did their backgrounds prepare them in different ways? Were their networks distinctive compared to other ethnicities? What was the pull of Asia for them? Did they really punch above their weight as some contemporaries thought, or was that just exaggerated rhetoric? If there was a distinctive ‘Scottish effect’ how is that to be explained?

Settlers and Sojourners

The Scottish Experience in Asia, c.1700 to the Present

John MacKenzie

This book examines the impact since 1600 of out migration from Scotland on the homeland, the migrants, and the destinations in which they settled. It does so through a focus on the under-researched themes of slavery, cross-cultural encounters, economics, war, tourism, and the modern diaspora since 1945.

Angela McCarthy

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