The intertwined pasts of Indian Ocean areas and regions in particular stimulated the development of my intellectual interests as an academic, resulting in my training as a world and global historian of the connections across this oceanic space between Africa and South Asia. In particular, I research and write about the intersecting histories of western India and southeastern Africa in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and about how these histories were mediated by particular social and commercial networks of South Asian merchant groups. Central to my research interests have been identifying how local, self-sustaining capitalists structured exchange fuelled by reciprocal consumer demand across the western reaches of the ocean at a time, from the 1750s, of growing and competing imperial interests for control over the global commerce of the Indian Ocean.
Keywords:
- 1350 to 1800
- 19th century
- African History
- Global History
- South Asian History
- African Diaspora History
- Empire and Colonialism
- Environment and Society
- Gender and Sexuality
- Historical Teaching and Practice
- Material Culture
- Money, Political Economy and Commercial Life
Research Interests:
- Global and Indian Ocean History
- Commodity Histories
- Globalization Merchant and Commercial Networks
- Oceanic Perspectives and Frameworks
- Comparative and Connected Slaveries
- South Asian and African History
I am currently involved in a major cross-disciplinary international research project (comprised of scholars from the United States, Japan and Australia) on the histories of the pearl fisheries of the Indian Ocean.
Currently, I am also at work on a second book project on the history of eucalyptus within the Portuguese Empire’s Atlantic and Indian Ocean spheres. I am interested especially in the influence of colonial forestry officials in developing and promoting eucalypt growing as an imperial and colonial strategy with far-reaching commercial, industrial and environmental effects.
Research Interests: historical intersections of western India and southeastern Africa in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries; histories of Indian Ocean pearl fisheries; history of eucalyptus within the Portuguese Empire’s Atlantic and Indian Ocean spheres
Regional Expertise: South Africa; Mozambique
Dr. Pedro Machado’s research concentrates on the intersecting histories of western India and southeastern Africa in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and how these histories were mediated by particular social and commercial networks of South Asian merchant groups. Dr. Machado’s current research has explored the pearl fisheries of the Indian Ocean that have long been an important maritime and commercial activity for societies from the Gulf and Red Sea to the Indonesian and South China Sea waters.
Subject Area(s): History
Research Interests:
- Indian Ocean history, World history, Slavery and material culture, and Merchant networks
