The Portuguese in the Creole Indian Ocean ― Essays in Historical Cosmopolitanism

When the Portuguese first entered the Indian Ocean centuries ago, they intruded upon an ancient creole and cosmopolitan world. Also, they entered a world with age-old connections to the Mediterranean. This book explores some of the intriguing interstices of colonial and other spaces in the ocean, through a scrutiny of personages, texts, and authors between the sixteenth and twenty-first centuries, in a variety of locales, namely, Goa (India), Macau (China), Malabar (Kerala, India), and Melaka (Malaysia). As the narrative goes back and forth between the ethnographic present and the past, it unearths the traces of old connected histories, such as those that link South and Southeast Asia. Furthermore, it explores similarities and differences with the Atlantic, especially in what concerns creolization and cosmopolitanism. It is an attempt by a Brazilian scholar to apply perspectives developed in the Atlantic - in particular, creolization - to Indian Ocean spaces and themes.

Fernando Rosa Ribeiro is a Research Affiliate in the English Department at Stellenbosch University, South Africa.