Travelling pasts : the politics of cultural heritage in the Indian Ocean world / edited by Burkhard Schnepel, Tansen Sen.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Travelling pasts : an introduction / Burkhard Schnepel -- Global linkages, connectivity and the Indian Ocean in the UNESCO World Heritage arena / Christoph Brumann -- 'Project Mausam' : India's transnational initiative : revisiting UNESCO's World Heritage convention / Himanshu Prabha Ray -- The history of the Hajj as heritage : asset or burden to the Saudi state? / Ulrike Freitag -- Materiality and mobility : comparative notes on heritagization in the Indian Ocean world / Katja Muller and Boris Wille -- Ambiguous pasts : the Indian Ocean world in Cape Town's public history / Nigel Worden -- Temple heritage of a Chinese migrant community : movement connectivity, and identity in the maritime world / Tansen Sen -- The uses of 'Chinese heritage' : foreign policy of the People's Republic of China in the contemporary Indo-Pacific world / Geoffrey Wade -- Heritage food : the materialization of connectivity in Nyonya cooking / Mareike Pampus -- Contradictions in the heritagization of Zanzibar 'Stone Town' / Abdul Sheriff -- The production of identities on the Island of Mayotte : a historical perspective / Iain Walker.

"Travelling Pasts, edited by Burkhard Schnepel and Tansen Sen, offers an innovative exploration of the issue of heritage in the Indian Ocean world. This collection of essays demonstrates how the heritagization of the past has played a vital role in processes and strategies related to the making of socio-cultural identities, the establishing of political legitimacies, and the pursuit of economic and geopolitical gains. The contributions range from those dealing with the impact of UNESCO's World Heritage Convention in the Indian Ocean world as a whole to those that address the politics of cultural heritage in various distinct maritime sites such as Zanzibar, Mayotte, Cape Town, the Maldives, Calcutta and Penang. Also examined are the Maritime Silk Road and the Project Mausam initiatives of the Chinese and Indian governments respectively. The volume is an important contribution to the fields of Indian Ocean Studies and Heritage Studies"-- Provided by publisher.