The central aim of this dissertation is to examine the history of connections between Omanis and Zanzibaris from the point of view of non-elites. The principle actors of histories of movements and connections between East Africa and the Arabian Peninsula has, in past scholarship, generally been elite men, principally statesmen and merchants. Many of the core assumptions about this history that have shaped past scholarship have been based on the priorities of this cast of actors whose goals and motives have been recorded in archival documents. Using oral history, this dissertation is able to offer a history "from below" that instead privileges the experiences of women and the rural poor. This research is based principally on interviews in Pemba, rural Unguja, and Oman. By shifting the central actors in this history, this dissertation is able to make several important contributions. It highlights the important divisions between Arabs in East Africa, a racial category too often discussed as if it represented a unified bloc. Further, it offers immobility as a crucial missing piece in this history that has been most often typified by the mobility of its most elite actors, arguing that mobility has been too central in our understanding of transnational communities.
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