Shaping Membership, Defining Nation explores and interprets the social politics, religion, and history of Africans (Habshis/Siddis) in Karnataka of South India. Focusing on the continuous dialog between African Indian historical formations and contemporary power structures, Pashington Obeng clearly explains the process of constructing socio-political and religious mores to respond to India's religious, socio-economic, and caste systems. The study begins by contextualizing the history of Africans in India before moving onto a sociological study. Pashington Obeng examines the formal and...

A compelling analysis of the complex history, identities, and self-determination of diasporic Africans (Habshis/Siddis) of Karnataka, South India. It addresses African Indian religious beliefs and practices, their deployment of expressive cultural expressions and forms of social and political power through which they engage effecitvely Indian's multi-religious, and complex social stratification systems.

This book investigates how women's power and caste cleavages often continue to transcend and crosscut the boundaries of caste/tribe, gender, age, class and religion in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh It examines the gendered divisions of labor in rural communities and how countervailing forces have restricted women's status and roles in South Asia.