Peasants in the Pacific. A Study of Fiji Indian Rural Society.

A (paid) passage to India: Migration and revealed willingness to pay for upper‐caste status

“…The lack of physical and occupation segregation in Fiji reduced important caste markers and prevented the complete replication of caste. Caste did not disappear, but the rigidity of caste dropped within Fiji (Gillion, 1962; Mayer, 1973).…”

“…The passage to Fiji itself eliminated the ability to self‐segregate; in an anecdote about a voyage, passengers of different castes stopped attempting to cook and eat separately after a wave caused separate castes' pots of food to mix together. Shipmates and fictive kin became important network ties in Fiji (Mayer, 1973). Hui and Kambhampati (2021) similarly argue that the lack of physical segregation in British Guiana reduced, though did not eradicate, the power of caste.…”

“…Brahmans were able to maintain a somewhat important role in Fiji. Anthropologists conducting fieldwork in the mid‐twentieth century noted that Brahmans still commanded reverence from the rest of the population even as the salience of caste declined (Cato, 1955; Jayawardena, 1980; Mayer, 1973).…”