Problematic spaces, problematic races: defining ‘Europeans’ in late colonial India

Abstract

This article considers how women and men acquired ‘European’ status in gender-specific ways in colonial India between the late nineteenth century and independence in 1947. Being considered ‘European’ in this setting required far more than ancestry and biological attributes, and depended heavily on class, culture, occupation and ongoing imperial border crossings that allowed individuals to maintain direct contact with Britain. Those born in India who failed to remain transient due to limited family incomes risked the stigma of becoming ‘domiciled Europeans‘, a group which strongly resembled (and was often equated with) the mixed-race Anglo-Indian community in socio-economic and cultural terms. The geographical location of children's schooling and the careers for which their education prepared them played crucial roles in determining perceptions of their adult racial status, and this article distinguishes between young women's and men's experiences by examining materials from school archives in India, official publications, and a range of contemporary and retrospective personal narratives.