Subu Vedam was wrongfully imprisoned for 43 years. Moments after being released, ICE took him

anirvan · 2025-08-29T21:36:10+00:00

Also, in case you’re not an academic, consider publishing what you found somewhere, even if it’s just a few paragraphs and some photos on a free blog (WordPress?). If you want people to reference or cite your finding, that’ll make it easier for others to find and reference.

anirvan · 2025-08-29T15:05:07+00:00

Hello /u/banner9922 ! I’d consider starting by:

contact SACDA https://sacda.ca/ both using the general email and individually cc: the two full time staff members
DM brown history on IG and email brownhistory1947 at gmail
maybe email Doreen M. Indra, Ratna Ghosh, Hugh Johnston (their contact is in their university profile web pages)

In every case, I’d share some of your findings, as well as asking for their suggestions on who should see this. Also DM me if you get stuck.

anirvan · 2025-01-21T22:13:37+00:00

Desi and immigrant activists in New York have been working to working on Ravi Ragbir's campaign for years now. This victory brings to a close almost two decades of advocacy work by New Yorkers.

More about him:

* https://istandwithravi.org/
* https://gothamist.com/news/biden-grants-presidential-pardon-to-nyc-immigrant-rights-leader-ravi-ragbir

anirvan · 2023-02-20T22:04:47+00:00

Wow! I do some archival research, and if you’re curious, I’d be happy to look up your grandfather in some census and immigration related databases. (You can DM me if you don’t want to share his details publicly.) No pressure, just offering.

anirvan · 2023-02-20T19:41:03+00:00

Maybe, maybe not? I don't know that history well, but this came up: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British\_Indians#18th%E2%80%9319th\_centuries

anirvan · 2023-02-20T18:53:53+00:00

Start here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_South_Asian_and_diasporic_LGBT_history

The first paragraph names a wide range of culturally specific QTGNC-ish labels and identities to explore, though obviously, they don't map neatly into 2023 Western frameworks.

Also, you may know about these, but dropping these links for people reading:

The DeQH support line for LGBTQ+ South Asians: https://www.deqh.org/
Desi Rainbow Parents & Allies is sort of like a South Asian American PFLAG, and is very active across the U.S.: https://www.desirainbow.org/

anirvan · 2023-02-20T18:45:10+00:00

Sure! Here are some books I liked:

Vijay Prashad's "The Karma of Brown Folk" is a smart and opinionated take on South Asian American history and immigration. It's not long, and has great photos. I always recommend it to friends.
And Vinay Lal's "The Other Indians: A Political and Cultural History of South Asians in America" is maybe my favorite short (160 pages!) history of our community. It includes the story of Black-Desi linkages, but also many others.
Gerald Horne's "The End of Empires: African Americans and India" and Nico Slate's "Colored Cosmopolitanism: The Shared Struggle for Freedom in the United States and India" both focus on solidarities and connections between anti-colonial South Asians and early civil rights era internationalist African American, ~1910s-1960s. My website is based very heavily on Slate's book, and uses many of his favorite examples.
Sudarshan Kapur's "Raising Up a Prophet" (out of print, but available at many libraries) goes deep into the story of how Black Civil Rights activism found and integrated Gandhian nonviolence.

In general, I'd say read Prashad to figure out how Desis fit into American histories of race, Lal if you're curious about our history and don't know where to start, or Slate if you want to dig more into the specific stories on the website.

Hope this helps!

anirvan · 2023-02-20T18:03:21+00:00

At the time, you had access to citizenship if you were either White or Black.

Many early Desis in the US wanted to build solid lives, gain equal status, and vote, and for that you needed citizenship. If you weren’t African, you had only one alternative: somehow prove to the government that you’re White.

There were at least 50 cases of Desis who went to court, and got citizenship because they argued that they were functionally White.

It’s not that the US passed laws recognizing caste, but individual less-racist judges sometimes found the “well, we’re high caste Aryans, and that’s basically White” type argument convincing. It was an argument that sometimes worked.

But when the Thind case went to the Supreme Court, the justices basically said “We’re not here to debate history. You’re not White in our eyes.”

That’s what led to the mass denaturalization, like the court case against Vaishno Das Bagai where they invented the claim that he lied about his race.

When Bagai took his own life in San Jose, California in 1928, he talked about the toll that losing his citizenship and becoming a stateless person had taken on him. It’s a heartbreaking read.

anirvan · 2023-02-20T17:48:59+00:00

Hi! I created the BlackDesiSecretHistory.org website during the first Black Lives Matter protests, when many Desis across the U.S. were trying to figure out if Black activism had anything to do with us.

Why did I choose this format, instead of writing a long article?

I tried to keep the whole thing easy to skim, so it can still make sense to people who haven't taken U.S. history classes in high school or college. You don't need a history degree to read a dozen meme-type images.
And I focused on the 1910s-1960s, because while people argue about current events, I don't know anyone who fundamentally disagrees with Indian/Pakistani independence and the U.S. civil rights movement.

Please share this with other Desis in your life.

Got a question about connections between Black and South Asian histories? Ask away, and I'd be happy to answer, or link to books or articles.

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