Connecting Continents provides a strong argument for undertaking interdisciplinary approaches to Indian Ocean studies through the lens of historical archaeology. This edited volume is the product of a workshop held at Stanford University in 2014 that brought together Indian Ocean scholars in the fields of archaeology, history, and art. The introduction by Krish Seetah (the volume editor) and Richard B. Allen lays a solid foundation to the volume by highlighting the value and potential of historical archaeology research about the Indian Ocean world. Seetah and Allen—whose combined expertise includes archaeology, history, and anthropology—highlight how integrating archaeological and historical approaches can improve our understanding of the movements and contact between populations, the transformation and preservation of sociocultural life, the impact of colonialism on the environment, and the local and global impacts of shared material culture. In many of these examples, archaeology contributes evidence of the materiality of everyday life that provides social and cultural context associated with the broader patterns and scattered details of Indian Ocean interaction and experiences found in historical sources.
The 10 chapters that follow the introduction interweave the contributions of archaeologists, historians, and artists working across and within the region. Although most of the chapters are based primarily on archaeological research, they engage with interdisciplinary historical and archaeological approaches to varying degrees and together exhibit the incredible range of varied experiences across the Indian Ocean in multiple spatial and temporal dimensions. To highlight some examples, the chapters discuss island colonization (Edward Alpers; Atholl Anderson et al.), the spread of Islam (Mark Horton et al.), the materiality of colonial encounters (Paul Lane), forced and free labor migration (Allen), and the history of pearling (Alistair Paterson). Of particular note is the sole chapter written by artists, Diana Heise and Martin Mhando, exploring knowledge production, material culture, and heritage through two documentary films, each focused on the construction of an object with cultural and historical significance in the Indian Ocean: the mtepe, a traditional sailboat, and the ravann, a traditional drum. The final three chapters focus on ongoing research in Mauritius, including work led by Seetah and his colleagues at Stanford that forms part of the Mauritian Archaeology and Heritage Project.
Overall, this volume successfully underlines the significance of interdisciplinary approaches to Indian Ocean studies first by deliberating how historical archaeology is defined in this context and then by showcasing the richness of historical and archaeological evidence from this region in multiple chapters, as described above. Seetah provides a persuasive argument for the development of collaborative interdisciplinary research between historians and archaeologists that is centered around understanding Indian Ocean history, culture, and landscapes in connection to the modern world. This approach is best demonstrated in the last chapter, in which Seetah investigates the ecological impact of colonization on Mauritius. The goal of this research is to trace the spread of malaria through a combination of historical archives, bioarchaeology, paleoclimate proxies, and ancient DNA to model how human and environmental constraints—including those associated with disease control—impact disease spread.
The challenges facing interdisciplinary approaches to Indian Ocean studies highlighted in this volume echo those of interdisciplinary research more broadly, including interdisciplinary differences, research gaps, and the rich diversity of histories and experiences across the region. The editor makes concrete suggestions for facilitating collaborative research that are applicable elsewhere, such as the integration of spatial analysis in historical work and the inclusion of historians in archaeological projects. Here, I note two additional dimensions of collaborative research that would serve future historical archaeology research in the region. Although these approaches form part of some of the research included in the volume, they are not always explicitly stated. The first is the importance of collaborating with local, Indigenous, and descendant communities to incorporate oral histories into narratives about the Indian Ocean. The second is greater engagement not just among diverse disciplines but among international scholars, especially those working outside the English-language sphere.
In summary, Connecting Continents provides a broad overview of current archaeological and historical research on the Indian Ocean through an interdisciplinary lens that expands and redefines the potential of historical archaeology, thereby exalting the relevance of Indian Ocean scholarship to scholars working throughout the world.
