Never the Twain Shall Meet? Causal Factors in Fijian-Indian Intermarriage

Abstract

Fijians and Indians. Indians and Fijians'. These two "races", "cultures", or "ethnic groups" -call it what you will- are dominant figures in the everyday practices, discourse and imagination concerning Fiji. Certainly, there is the considerable presence of non-Fijian and non- Indian peoples in Fiji. The Chinese, Rotumans, Polynesians, Banabans, Solomon Islanders, Europeans and mixed race populations have also all significantly contributed to and influenced the shape and character of Fiji's history and will continue to do so. Yet it is the Fijian and Indian communities that seem to command, dominate and polarize events that affect Fiji. One obvious contributing factor to the perception of dominance is the demographic competition of sorts between them since 1946, when Indians first overtook indigenous peoples in the population stakes. Consequently it is difficult to comment upon contemporary Fiji without reference to either community. Each is inextricably tied in myriad, complicated ways to the significant institutions of the country- in politics, economics, social life, religion, and culture. Fiji is a place where the life courses of the two communities seem to be intertwined in a mutual dependency of sorts. The sugar industry in Fiji, for example, which for so long has driven and accounted for much of the country's economy, and depends largely on the labor of endian cane farmers, is heavily indebted to the lease of agricultural lands held by Fijian landowners in what is today becoming an increasingly complex land problem. In short, treatises on Fiji are precarious without reference, however brief, to both parties. The past, present, and future of Fiji has, is and may continue to be caught up in the relationships between Fiji's indigenous peoples and the Indians who are the descendants of Indian indentured laborers and Indian "free settlers". Much of Fiji's contemporary history has been shaped by relations between Fijians and Indians since British colonialism in 1874 and subsequent colonial policy.