253pp., b/w & colour illus., paperback, Duke University Press, Durham, 2025

ISBN: 9781478031345

Jordache A. Ellapen re-thinks the relationship between blackness, Afro-Indianness and Africanness, and analyses how the work of artists such as Sharlene Khan, Mohau Modisakeng, Lebohang Kganye and Reshma Chhiba challenge persistent racial categories to create new imaginaries of freedom.

“Indenture Aesthetics is an outstanding contribution to transnational queer studies, African and South Asian diaspora studies, visual culture studies, and the study of race and sexuality in South Africa. Focusing on ‘Afro-Indian intimacies’ through a queer studies lens, Jordache A. Ellapen’s work is a significant addition to African queer studies and the study of South African sexualities specifically as well as to queer diaspora and queer of color scholarship more broadly.” Gayatri Gopinath, author of Unruly Visions: The Aesthetic Practices of Queer Diaspora

“Jordache A. Ellapen shows that by turning to the history of Indian indentureship in South Africa we might find a different vocabulary through which to understand South Africa’s Indian population and its relationship to black Africans. This fascinating book’s unexpected pairing of black African and Indian artists and Ellapen’s critical reading and analytical practice offers a refreshing and needed departure from the way that Indian communities and their cultural practices are currently discussed. A beautiful and timely book.” Xavier Livermon, author of Kwaito Bodies: Remastering Space and Subjectivity in Post-Apartheid South Africa

Jordache A. Ellapen is Associate Professor in the Department of Black Studies at the University of Rochester and co-editor of We remember differently: Race, memory, imagination.

INDENTURE AESTHETICS, Afro-Indian Femininities and the Queer Limits of South African Blackness

: Ellapen (J.)

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