Lost Histories

Between the 1880s and 1950s, as the United States closed its doors to Asian immigrants, two groups of Muslim men from British colonial India – silk traders from present-day Indian West Bengal and ship-workers from present-day Bangladesh – defied the racist exclusion laws, entered the country, and found shelter in African American and Puerto Rican communities. Here, they intermarried and began new lives. This site collects the remarkable stories of the inter-racial and interfaith families and communities that formed on the racialized margins of full citizenship – in New York and New Jersey; New Orleans and Charleston; in Detroit, Baltimore, and beyond. It is an ongoing extension of the film In Search of Bengali Harlem, by Vivek Bald & Alaudin Ullah, and the book, Bengali Harlem and the Lost Histories of South Asian America, by Vivek Bald.

Coming Soon

by vbald01in Uncategorizedon May 1, 2012January 22, 2013

Watch here for stories, interviews, images, video, and archival materials related to the histories of South Asian Muslim migration to New Orleans, Charleston, Detroit, West Baltimore, and New York City between the 1890s and 1940s.

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