“[A] magisterial history of twentieth-century Fiji.... The historical research is thorough and scrupulous, and the presentation is lucid. Lal brings together a wealth of information, much of it previously unavailable and the earlier available materials often reframed in thought-provoking ways.... Perhaps its greatest strength is that is presents the history of modern Fiji as very complicated and multifaceted.” ―The Contemporary Pacific Pacific Islands Monograph Series No.11 Published in association with the Center for Pacific Islands Studies, University of Hawai‘i

Broken Waves: A History of the Fiji Islands in the Twentieth Century

History

Lal, Brij V.

Australia & Oceania

University of Hawaii Press

Girmitiyas: The origins of the Fiji Indians

Asia

Journal of Pacific History

Levelling Wind: Remembering Fiji (Pacific Series)

Biographies & Memoirs

Community & Culture

ANU Press

A Time Bomb Lies Buried discusses the debates which took place in Suva and London as well as the politics and processes which led Fiji to independence in 1970 after 96 years of colonial rule. It provides an essential background to understanding the crises and convulsions which have haunted Fiji ever since in its search for a constitutional settlement for its multiethnic population.

A Time Bomb Lies Buried: Fiji's Road to Independence, 1960-1970 (State, Society and Governance in Melanesia)

ANU E Press

How are Pacific lives imagined, written and read? How are they refracted through prisms of process? From legends about culture heroes to biographies of national leaders, from tales of ancestors to stories of contemporary men and women, from lives told of both the famous and the nameless, this collection of essays - by historians and anthropologists, Islanders and Island scholars - probes questions of personhood, identity, memory, and time across the sweep of the Pacific, as well as practical issues of research and writing.

Telling Pacific Lives: Prisms of Process

Luker, Vicki

May 19, 2000. Fiji’s democratically elected multiracial government is hijacked by a group of armed gunmen led by George Speight, and held hostage for fifty days. Suva, the capital, is torched and looted as Speight’s supporters gather on the lawns of the parliamentary complex, dancing, cooking food, celebrating the purported abrogation of the constitution that brought the People’s Coalition government to power. The country is plunged into darkness yet again, enduring the pain of three coups in a period of just thirteen years. The process of healing and reconciliation, symbolised by the enactment of a new Constitution, unanimously approved by Parliament and blessed by the powerful Great Council of Chiefs, lies discarded, as winds of ethnic chauvinism sweep through the countryside, damaging the fragile fabric of multiculturalism that was carefully constructed by so many over many years. The economy is on the brink of collapse, investor confidence has vanished, and the best and the brightest are seeking succour on other shores. Fiji falls victim, yet again, to the prejudice and greed of a section of its people. This book gathers together a handful of memoirs of those tragic events in Fiji. They were written while the gun was still smoking; personal, anguished reactions of people from all walks of life, concerned about a country they all love but deeply distressed by the developments there. They are first reactions. They will in time become essential building blocks for a larger interpretive framework of academic analysis about origins, processes and impacts. Straight from the heart, these memoirs will be remembered as the people of Fiji and their friends elsewhere contemplate the wreckage and ruin brought about by that act of madness in the month of May 2000.

Coup: Reflections on the Political Crisis in Fiji

Pretes, Michael

This book explores the factors behind – and the implications of – the 2006 coup. It brings together contributions from leading scholars, local personalities, civil society activists, union leaders, journalists, lawyers, soldiers and politicians – including deposed Prime Ministers Laisenia Qarase and Mahendra Chaudhry. The 2006 Military Takeover in Fiji: A Coup to End All Coups? is essential reading for those with an interest in the contemporary history of Fiji, politics in deeply divided societies, or in military intervention in civilian politics.

The 2006 Military Takeover in Fiji: A Coup to End All Coups? (State, Society and Governance in Melanesia)

Firth, Stewart

Fraenkel, Jon

Literature & Fiction

To read this evocative book is to be thrust into a Fiji that has, for the moment, been snuffed out by military might: a Fiji of political parties, parliamentary politics, elections, manifestoes, campaigns, democractic defence of interests, party manoeuvres, and constitutional protection of rights and freedoms. It is a comprehensive and eloquent re-telling of the story of Fiji politics from independence in 1970 to 1999 through the perspective of Fiji’s greatest living statesman, Jai Ram Reddy, by one of the world’s most distinguished scholars of its history and politics.

In the Eye of the Storm: Jai Ram Reddy and the Politics of Postcolonial Fiji

“A wonderfully rich, insightful and personally touching collection of essays by the Pacific region’s most prolific and engaging historian. Brij Lal writes eloquently and poetically about his professional and political journeys, and the many different people and worlds he has encountered on the way. Readers will be inspired by this collective account of a courageous life committed to the achievement of democratic freedom and social justice. What shines through these pages is Lal’s love of and commitment to Fiji, from which he has been painfully exiled.” - David Hanlon, Professor of History &amp; Former Director of the Center for Pacific Islands Studies, University of Hawaii at Manoa. “Intersections is a compilation of Brij Lal’s essays where academic knowledge combines with life world experience. The voice behind these essays is always courageous and the writing itself indicative of a highly disciplined mind. Read this book with an open mind as Lal explores with sensitivity a country he loves intensely and as he reminisces on the vocation of a scholar. Savour the book’s historical insights, enter into its subaltern worlds, debate and challenge its findings, and in that moment of engagement shed a tear for a country which has lost its memory.” - Vijay Mishra, Professor of English, Murdoch University “Brij Lal is a master craftsman and all his skills are on display in this fascinating work which blends autobiography with social, political and historical analysis to produce a work of impeccable scholarship. Lal emerges as much more than a historian as he reflects on the discipline of History, the changing nature of academic life, the challenges of the Indian diaspora, indenture and his travels. He may be banned from his homeland, but somehow one gets the impression that his influence is alive in Fiji, his adopted Australia and across the world. True to his indentured roots, he is still digging, still writing, and still making history.” - Goolam Vahed, Associate Professor of History, University of KwaZulu-Natal

Intersections: History, Memory, Discipline

“It is a milestone in subaltern studies, a biographical journey penned by a living relic of the indentured experience and a scholar whose thoroughly interdisciplinary approach is a good example for the anthropologist, the sociologist or the economist who wish to see the proper integration of their disciplines in a major historical work.” Brinsley Samaroo, University of the West Indies, St Augustine Campus, Trinidad “Professor Lal has made a most distinguished contribution to scholarship on Indian indentured labour in Fiji. His research is characterised by the use of new methodological approaches to the study of history, and by a comprehensive consideration of both quantitative and literary sources. In beautifully written articles, he has arrived at fresh and novel findings.” Ralph Shlomowitz, Flinders University of South Australia “Professor Lal has produced a body of work which makes him the premier scholar of the Indian diaspora. His meticulous research, the depth of scholarship, the empathy, and the elegance have earned him great respect among Indian diaspora scholars. The themes covered in this book are relevant to other overseas Indian communities; and they are handled with such mastery that his reputation is secured.” Clem Seecharan, University of North London “Brij Lal’s Chalo Jahaji is an intensely personal journey through his life and that of the 60,000 Indians who became girmitiyas in Fiji. The intricate history is measured, but Lal reveals himself and his family in a way historians seldom do. This proud grandson of a girmitiya is equally a proud son of Fiji. Chalo Jahaji is Pacific history at its best: rigorous and critical, informative and involved.” Clive Moore, University of Queensland

Chalo Jahaji: On a journey through indenture in Fiji

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