Whether you are Mauritian or not, most of us, at one point or another, have heard the plethora of labels attributed to Mauritian culture; the rainbow nation; the fruit-salad; a melting pot. Since its independence in 1968 our island has been internationally renowned for maintaining a peaceful co-existence between diverse cultures, ethnicities, and religions. Like the Flamboyant, Mauritius’ colors are exoticised – from our skin to the seven colors of Chamarel – within the international imagination, laying claim to an exceptional multiculturalism that reads as a picture-perfect postcard. Though for those of us who call this bustling Island home, an internal tension persists between the reality we are exposed to, and this utopic ideal the rest of the world feeds on.
Unlike most post-colonial nations, Mauritius shares a unique history in that it holds no [documented] indigenous population, with its two largest ethnic groups – the Creoles and the Indo-Mauritians – being descendant of a brutal colonial history marked by slavery (and indentured labor, arguably a different form of the same), land dispossession and cultural erasure. While the research into Mauritius’s history and its post-colonial influences is arguably limited, scholars have exposed the harsh realities of Afro-Malagasy slavery and in so provided a stepping stone to understand the root of current socio-economic issues. One of the most significant findings, made by Vijaya Teelock’s “Breaking the Wall of Silence”, explores how the enslaved population was actively stripped of ancestral ties by being given new names, intentionally being mixed with other ethnic groups, and forced into religious/linguistic assimilation, which thus manufactured a lasting identity struggle and subsequent alienation across several spheres. While this past evidently continues to hinder social, political, and economic equality, Mauritius has struggled to articulate and tend to these legacies, visible across factors like the socio-economic domination of the Franco-Mauritian minority and the marginalisation of the Creole community.
Our reputation as an exotic, borderline paradisiac island filled with hospitable and vibrant people (and culture) does not make its claim without shaping itself for the Orientalist gaze – a manner of appropriating Eastern and Southern nations/peoples/cultures deriving from a Western colonialist view that treats them as exotic, backwards and inherently inferior. When we consider our island's colonial history and its ongoing legacy – visible for example in the way hotels, schools, and districts still bear the name of colonisers, whose statues still line the corridor at Place D’Armes) while at times even advertising a colonial aesthetic as part of the experience – this profitable image of empty beaches and smiling locals lays the ongoing exploitation bare; the fetishisation of a people, one that ultimately others Mauritians on their own land by stripping them of an identity beyond economic and foreign interests. Let us not forget the widely disputed ‘Mark Twain’ quote (“Mauritius was made first, and then heaven; and that heaven was copied after Mauritius.”) that our tourism industry nevertheless parades as an invitation for this orientalist gaze. The role played by, typically Mauritian Creoles, marketed to the international audience, has become unsettling across an accumulating amount of habits. Of course, that is not to dismiss the unshakeable wit, pride, and resistance practiced behind the scenes by Mauritians, undeniably contributing to the solidarity and liveliness of our community; however, it remains painful to witness this commercialised legacy precede us in seemingly small ways, like the tendency to “bat enn ti fransce” or to instinctively defer to white ‘expatriates,’ whose color still subconsciously signals a certain social and economic standing when contrasted with the ‘migrant’. When it comes to witnessing this internalised hierarchy, it is perhaps not a coincidence that Mauritius’ most iconic symbol, the Dodo, has been reappropriated as the name of the Franco-Mauritian club ‘Dodo Club’ that is infamous for exclusively associating with their own.
It is worth asking whether these social reflexes made by (some) Creole Mauritians today, that actively repositions them as inferior to the White elite, are inherited rather than incidental. Beyond the obvious violent and legal means of restriction and exploitation, colonisers often enforced their hierarchy by systematically surveilling and reporting on ‘defying’ behaviors, thus keeping its enslaved population fearful. It would be no great surprise if that conditioning outlived its initial colonial structures, resurfacing today across quieter mechanisms of social control like the notorious palab. Today however, this fear of being seen stepping out of place is not only governed by the (subconscious) placement of whiteness at the top but also across our own inclination to constantly mind and judge other people’s business.
One may further ask, in hindsight, whether this shift to internal social control signifies something more severe in regards to our community. Within recent years what has been previously been labelled the Malaise Creole has become the Malaise Morisien as a result of the economy's newfound focus on establishing itself as a high-end commercial and residential hub for ‘expats’. With skyrocketing costs of living and stagnant minimum wages, the general Mauritian population is beginning to feel socially and economically excluded. This segregation is further visible across physical boundaries. Take for instance the increasing (marketing of) privatisation of legally public beaches by luxurious resorts, villas, and private residences that are essentially turning these post-cards into deeds. Of Mauritius’ 322 Kilometer coastline, a striking 48 kilometers, or 15% remains genuinely for public access. For a culture whose traditions and sense of community is significantly strengthened by beach centered activities like Sunday barbecues and picnics or Sega-Ravanne performances by the shore, this theft of land demarcates a visible movement that is slowly squeezing us out.
Mauritius can be said to have become highly skilled at re-inventing itself for whoever it can profit from – the paradise for the tourist and the safe haven for the investor – however the question of who truly belongs here, on what terms, as well as who we are as Mauritians beyond this profitable image, remains one we have yet to market convincingly to ourselves. In going over our history and how our current policies, behaviors, and sense of identity are largely informed by these lingering inequalities, we remind ourselves of what exactly we need to fight for. I believe that one of our most defining characteristics is our Lakorite: our ability to, despite the ethnic, economic, and social divides, practice and maintain a sense of solidarity and belonging with one another and our island. It is specifically because it is so hard to trace the origin of this phenomenon that I am so intent on asserting it as ours. It is not a label assigned to us from the outside, but rather a quiet, everyday practice we return to when no one else is looking, perhaps being so defining because it has never needed an audience to feel real. To be Mauritian means to hold onto Lakorite as more than sentiment. It is exactly this that carried a decade of sustained pressure to restore Pomponette Beach to public status in 2025, concrete proof that solidarity, organised rather than simply felt, can still reverse what profit tries to take from us. If our coastline, our wages, and our sense of belonging continue to be renegotiated in rooms we are not invited into, Lakorite is one thing that is still fully ours for as long as we're willing to use it.
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