Malaysian Telugus: Untold Stories of Andhra Pioneers

Malaysian Telugus: Untold Stories of Andhra Pioneers chronicles the history and identity of the Telugu community in Malaysia, focusing on the struggles, triumphs, and cultural preservation efforts of Telugu migrants from Andhra Pradesh who came to British Malaya in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The book adopts the perspective of ‘walking through time,’ by first looking briefly at the history of migration of the early generation of the Telugus—the ‘pioneers’, as the book calls them—from Andhra in India to the then British colonial Malaya.

Taking the outsider—insider approach, the author then weaves the chapters with a rich ethnographic description of the two major Telugu communities, one in Teluk Intan and the other in Bagan Datoh—both in Perak—focusing on their language, culture and religion which form the basis of their identity. The book then explores in some depth the ways in which the Telugus recreate and bond the community in the land of domicile, and how they build roots in and identification with the new homeland. It also discusses the education of their children in Telugu schools, marriage and religious practices, the role of temples in maintaining their identity, and how they reaffirm their ties with their land of origin through social memories, identity and cultural heritage.