Research Postcards: Prof. Gauvin Bailey in the Mascarene Islands

As our summer series of Research Postcards continues, we check back in with Prof. Gauvin Bailey from the far-flung islands of La Réunion and Mauritius. There, Prof. Bailey resumes his research on the architecture and social history of the former French colonies in the Indian Ocean:

Prof. Gauvin Bailey: "I am currently in the Mascarene Islands (La Réunion, Mauritius) – best known as the former home of the dodo – for a month as phase II of my summer research on architecture and slavery in French former colonies. I am conducting field and archival research to determine an architectural typology of French plantation colonies in the Indian Ocean and to research the lives of builders working here in the 18th and early 19th centuries. The architecture is more like that of the other plantation colonies of Guadeloupe, Martinique, Saint-Domingue (Haiti) and French Guiana than it is to that of other former French colonies in the Indian Ocean, where plantation slavery did not occur. I am trying to determine why this is the case, as these islands are so far away from the Caribbean – in fact, they’re 950 km East of the cost of Madagascar!

"As well as photographing plantation houses, buildings related to the sugar and other plantation industries, and the urban mansions of slaveholders, I am looking at the so-called ‘cases créoles’ (‘creole’ houses) of the descendants of the enslaved, Hindu temples, and other non-European religious sites. This is not always easy as many of them are quite remote, and these volcanic islands are difficult to get around by car. I am also trying to read between the lines of archival documents to find out more about the builders who created the architecture in this region, whether French, free Indian, free Black, or enslaved (African and Indian). The goal is to find out more about their daily lives: such as, how communities grew through intermarriage, apprenticeship, manumission, and business partnerships.

"Archival work has taken me to places such as the Archives Départementales in Saint-Denis, La Réunion, where archivists have shown me the latest paper conservation techniques to preserve documents such as censuses, plantation maps, and notarial documents, which will eventually be digitized. The attached picture is one of the grand houses of slaveholders that still line the fashionable rue de Paris in Saint-Denis, wooden neoclassical frame structures that would not look out of place in Martinique. Eventually (when I get better wifi!) I will post these on my website: colonialarchitectureproject.org."