A History of Fijian Women’s Activism (1900–2010)

Womens History Review, 2008

This article traces the etymology of Indo-Fijian (Fiji Indian) feminisms in Fiji. In the first section, the resistances of female indentured laborers (for example, Sukhrania, Naraini and Kunti) are recovered as reflections of early forms of individualized feminisms in the early 1900s. In the second section, it is proposed that the informal and organic, yet socially significant movement of Indian women laborers in Fiji in the 1920s comprised one of the first collective intersections of gendered, classed and ethnicized relationships in Fiji. The 1930 (post-indenture) women's movement, with its main emphasis on economic empowerment, is included in the discussion of Indo-Fijian feminisms in the third section. The conclusion highlights that while each phase of the early feminist movement in Fiji focused on a different set of concerns that impacted on the lives of Indo-Fijian women, this group of women have played and continue to play a prominent role in furthering the rights of women nationally and regionally. Like Griffen, other women from Fiji 5 argue that a Fijian feminist movement-one that advocated women's social, cultural, economic and political rights on the grounds Margaret Mishra was born in the Fiji Islands and lived and worked there until 2001. She then moved to Melbourne and wrote her doctoral dissertation on the history of the women's movement in Fiji at Monash University.

2008

The overarching aim of this study is to trace evidence of resistant behaviour among subordinate groups in the first forty years of Fiji's colonial history (1874-1914). By rereading archival materials "against the grain", listening to oral history, and engaging postcolonial scholarship, the study intends to disturb accepted ways of understanding Fiji's past. This approach reveals the existence of numerous people, voices, and events which until recently have remained largely on the margins of Fiji's process of historical production. As a chronological survey, the study produces a body of evidence which uncovers a rich array of forms of resistance. The points at which these forms of resistance engaged dominant culture are divided into two broad categories. The first examines several forms of organized resistance such as the Colo War of 1876, the Tuka Movement of 1878 to 1891, the Seaqaqa War of 1894, the Movement for Federation with New Zealand from 1901 to 1903, ...

Abstract The ‘Old Indo-Fijian Diaspora,’ of the indentured labourers who came to Fiji between 1879 and 1920 has been an important area of scholarship and research. According to Dr. Brij Lal, some 60,965 indentured labourers came to Fiji during the indenture period; of these,45,439 where from northern India, embarking at Calcutta and the rest came from Southern India after 1903 when recruitment had begun there (Lal, 1983:2). After serving their indenture term, many indentured labourers (such as those interviewed in Ahmed Ali’s book; Girmit: Indian indenture experience in Fiji) revealed that they were trapped away in a far-away land and many had no choice but to make Fiji their home (Ali, 2004). Brij Lal strengthens this point by stating that Indians did not leave their homeland with the view of completely severing their links with it but many of them hoped to go back after acquiring wealth in the colonies (lal, 1983:4). The indentured labourers comprised of Indians of different classes, geographical locations, castes, languages, occupations and an unequal gender balance. The pain and remorse felt by these labourers were worth recording, studying, researching and internalising as today this has provided many intellectuals, academics and researching souls with information to broaden the studies in this area and provide exposure on the Old Indo-Fijian Diaspora. This paper therefore looks in to the movement of Indians from India to Fiji during the indenture period and particularly allegorises the role played by the female girmitiyas during the time of indenture where Gyarti Spivak’s notion of the “triad-use, exchange and surplus” would be employed to explore and discuss the traditional role of the woman girmitiyas (Spivak, 1996). Indo-Fijian women today are thousands of miles away from India yet they are still influenced by the homeland and various connections are evident almost a 130 years since the beginning of the indenture system. These connections to the homeland do not imply that Indo-Fijian women are connected to the whole of India but refers to them identifying themselves with specific aspects. These ‘specific’ aspects in this paper are limited to what these women perceive through the various media available in Fiji and for the purpose of this research, namely: the Bollywood cinema, Independent cinema, Daily-life drama series via Hindi satellite television and the Diaspora poetics (literary works of Indo-Fijian writers on the indenture experiences). In this light the role of the Bollywood cinema and the Daily-life drama series of the Hindi satellite television (which are adopted from epics/religious texts) are of great interest due to copious stereotypical characters of the binary of ‘good’ and ‘evil’ and thematic representations of ‘moral’ and ‘immoral’ (dharmik/ adharmik) values depicted through these media. A closer look will also be taken at the female portrayals in the above mentioned media and will be weighed against feminist claims of portrayals of ‘round’ female characters on screen in contrast to the Independent cinema which moves away from the fictive and indulges in those subjects of culture and human nature which are not easily accepted by the subjects in concern. Moreover, this paper looks at (through a primary research) how closely the contemporary Indo-Fijian women are connected to the cultural, social and religious aspects of India via the various media mentioned. Additionally, Vijay Mishra’s notion of the emergence of a ‘diasporic imaginary’ growing out of a sense of being marginalised or by being rejected outright by nation states would be looked at in terms of the views and experiences of the Indo-Fijian women from the primary research, illustrating that this diasporic imaginary is also created and promoted mostly through the ‘romanticised images’ of the Bollywood cinema and the Hindi satellite television. The diaspora poetics is also seen as a means of connecting the contemporary Indo-Fijian women (elite group) to the homeland, opposing Vijay Mishra’s claim that the literary works on Indo-Fijians reissue versions of ‘the conscious falsification of reality’ of the Girmit ideology. Instead a positive direction will be ventured towards with Salman Rushdie’s idea of creating fictions of the imaginary homeland (Indias of the mind) and using one’s own memory to create memory of the homeland (an imaginative truth). This paper discusses the role of the above mentioned media in creating ‘Indias of the mind’ amongst the contemporary urban dwelling Indo-Fijian women. Additionally, in order to get first hand information, a survey was carried out and questionnaires were distributed randomly to 100 Indo-Fijian women around the Samabula area, a suburb of Suva, the capital of Fiji. The women used for the primary research varied in age, ranging from 16 to over 60 years with different educational, geographical (that is, where in Fiji they are originally from) caste and sub-racial backgrounds.

This paper aims to present an Indigenous Fijian perspective on Indigenous feminisms. Although Indigenous feminisms have gained traction within recent trends of feminist theory, voices from the Pacific still remain relatively quiet. I aim to explore this quiet space by unpacking what my Aunties, Bubu (Grandmother), and Mother taught me about embodying Kaiviti (Indigenous Fijian) teachings. I was taught nai tavi ni na marama ena matavuvale (the woman holds the family). I will spend the paper discussing what it means to hold the family and how this influences my understandings of feminisms. Through the use of storytelling, this paper will reflect on the possibility of a Kaiviti feminism. Part of this story includes reflecting on what it means to engage in discussion on Kaiviti feminism on lands so far removed from Fiji, but whose shores are also touched by the Pacific Ocean. Hau’ofa (1994) reminds us that we are the ocean and that the ocean was never a barrier for us; instead, it was and continues to be our highway. It is with this logic in mind that this paper explores Kaiviti feminisms far from my home, on Turtle Island, ignoring the constructed borders of the colonial states and instead opting to have a discussion with other Indigenous feminists about making space for Pacific feminisms while standing on grounds that are touched by the Pacific Ocean.

2016

This article sets out to retrieve two accounts of female deviance in colonial Fiji. It will posit rule-breaking behavior as a reaction to colonial and patriarchal efforts to regulate female behavior and sexuality. The article simultaneously aims to undo rigid categorizations of female deviance by relating such acts to historical circumstance. Police records, court proceedings and news items from The National Archives of Fiji are cited to show how indigenous Fijian woman, Davilo, and indentured Indian woman, Sukhrania, transgressed socially constructed paradigms of morality by procuring abortions in 1884 and engaging in prostitution in 1909, respectively. By relabeling these alleged acts of deviance as survival strategies emerging out of women’s experiences of ‘double colonization’, this article will reconstruct two ‘minor’ anecdotal fragments awkwardly wedged within the realm of ‘mainstream history’

1997

In the 1890s the British administration of Fiji commissioned an inquiry into the decrease of the indigenous population. Its subsequent report -a seminal text -figured Fijian women as both a cause and potential solution to the problem. This study explores what was said and done about Fijian women in the context of 'the decrease'. The first section addresses the epidemiological conditions which induced Fijian depopulation; and the political and intellectual factors which shaped a discourse alleging the incompetence of Fijian mothers. The second section tests one popular theory: that this incompetence was due to deleterious effects from the 'abolition of polygamy'. We discuss pre-Christian marriage practices, how they changed, and whether these changes elevated Fijian infant mortality. The third section examines measures that were taken around the turn of the century on the premise that Fijian mothers were congenitally defective. Attempts were made to change them by edict, education and training. They all failed; and Fijians were abandoned to extinction just when their demographic recovery began. The fourth section deals with later shifts in the discourse: a period when it lapsed and official attention focussed on Fiji's Indian women; the interwar era when the discourse was revived in the context, so to speak, of a demographic race between Indians and Fijians; and finally its appropriation by Fijian men in an effort to enhance their control over Fijian women and prevent interracial liaisons. Changes after World War 2 rendered the discourse on decrease obsolete. The conclusion returns us to debates in chapter one about about the etiology of disease in New World population decline and a reflection on the place of women in this process.

2010

This paper aims to shed light on the validity of previous studies by reconstructing in detail the Lami's historical development from its beginning to the 1990s. The Lami is a cooperative group in Fiji whose main characteristic has been radically changing its members' lives. Lami people not only abolish or simplify some parts of Fijian customs such as wedding and funeral ceremonies; they also abstain from luxuries such as kava and tobacco. Previous studies take for granted (1) the relationship between characteristic activities of the Lami and its members' sterile land and unstable land rights, and (2) the Lami's relationship with Melanesian cargo cults such as the Viti Kabani movement in Fiji. In this paper I would like to use archival and ethnographic studies to question these assumed relationships.

2002

Journal of international women's studies, 2016

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2017

Indo-Fijians make up about 37 per cent of Fiji's current population and have a unique language and culture, which evolved since Indians fist arrived into Fiji as indentured labourers on board the ship Leonidas in 1879. Since their arrival in the British colony as sugar plantation labourers, Indo-Fijian activists led counter hegemonic movements against the colonial government during and after indenture in 1920-21, 1943 and 1960. Indo-Fijian activists demanded political equality with Europeans and constantly agitated for better wages and living conditions through disruptive strikes and boycotts. After independence, the focus of Indo-Fijians shifted to political equality with indigenous Fijians and access to land leases from indigenous landowners on reasonable terms; and these were ongoing themes in the 1972, 1977 and 1982 elections. However, Indo-Fijian counter hegemony took a new form in 1987 with the formation of the multiracial Fiji Labour Party and National Federation Party co...