Nidhi Mahajan (Title TBD)

The Center for Asia Pacific Studies is pleased to welcome Nidhi Mahajan for a talk on interregional connections between Africa and Asia. Tracing the voyages of the wooden sailing vessel - the dhow or vahan - Sagar Sanpati from Mandvi in India to Mombasa’s Old Port, Mahajan explores how social life and trade in port are shaped by hospitality. On board the dhow, Indian sailors build connections, conduct trade, and navigate tensions with fellow sailors, anthro­pologists, street-level bureaucrats, and brokers. Seeing the world from the dhow challenges traditional ideas of guest and host, showing that Indian sailors, with a long history of Indian Ocean connections, were never strangers in Mombasa. Hospitality, she argues, has linked different Indian Ocean ports and reshaped notions of space and sovereignty. 

Mahajan also links this history to the present, showing how long-standing India-Africa connections continue to resonate today. She highlights Zohran Mamdani’s campaign, rooted in his East African Indian diasporic heritage, as a clear example of how these Indian Ocean ties still influence contemporary social and political life.

Speaker bio: 
Nidhi Mahajan is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Her first book, Moorings: Voyages of Capital across the Indian Ocean, was published by UC Press in June 2025. She has also published in journals such as Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, Monsoon, History of the Present, and Island Studies Journal. 

In addition to her academic work, Mahajan is a practicing artist, with her projects exhibited at the Sharjah Architecture Triennial, Diriyah Biennale (Saudi Arabia), Macondo Literature Festival (Kenya), Hayy Jameel (Saudi Arabia), Khoj Studios (India), and other international venues.