“Better lives”: The transgenerational positioning of social mobility in the South Asian Canadian diaspora
TL;DR: This paper explored how migration as "ordinary trauma" affects generations in diasporic families and how a diaspora context creates shifting gender norms, whereby South Asian fathers sometimes come to view daughters not only as future wives and/or mothers of the collective, but also as potential workers who might either maintain or even raise family class status.
Abstract: Synopsis Within the Canadian South Asian diaspora, family/work dynamics highlight the transgenerational nature of class status, social mobility and occupational identity. I draw upon feminist research on migration to analyze qualitative interviews that I conducted with South Asian Canadian girls and women between the ages of 16 and 34. Using narrative as a method, I mine subjects' stories for traces of identity work around familial occupational status, exploring how migration as “ordinary trauma” affects generations in diasporic families. I also look at how a diasporic context creates shifting gender norms, whereby South Asian fathers sometimes come to view daughters not only as future wives and/or mothers of the collective, but also as potential workers who might either maintain or even raise family class status.
Citations
More filters
TL;DR: It is found that a lesbian, gay or bisexual orientation corresponds with a higher likelihood of being physically active among women (especially among less educated women) but not among men, and the positive effect of income onBeing physically active is strong among visible minority men, of moderate strength among White men and women and weak to non-existent amongvisible minority women.
Abstract: Leisure-based physical activity is socially stratified in Canada. To date, inequalities in physical activity by race or ethnicity, gender, class or sexual orientation, in Canada and elsewhere, have largely been investigated as distinct, additive phenomena. Informed by intersectionality theory, this paper examines whether racial identity, gender, class and sexuality 'intersect' with one another to predict physical activity in data from Cycles 2.1 and 3.1 of the Canadian Community Health Survey (n= 149 574). In particular, we apply the intersectional principle of multiplicativity which suggests that people's experiences of their gender identities are raced, classed and sexualized; their racial experiences are gendered, classed and sexualized, and so forth. We find that the positive effect of income on being physically active is strong among visible minority men, of moderate strength among White men and women and weak to non-existent among visible minority women. We also find that a lesbian, gay or bisexual orientation corresponds with a higher likelihood of being physically active among women (especially among less educated women) but not among men. These multiplicative findings undermine additive approaches to investigating social inequalities in leisure-based physical activity and pave the way for future intersectional analyses of axes of inequality and their diverse, intersecting effects.
35 citations
Cites background from "“Better lives”: The transgeneration..."
...Perhaps the nature of the manifestation of patriarchy within families in some racialized communities (George and Ramkissoon, 1998; Talbani and Hasanali, 2000; Rajiva, 2013) or the appropriation of and resistance to dominant discourses pertaining to sport by LGB people (Bridel and Rail, 2007) interact with class in complex ways to shape certain leisure-based physical activities....
[...]
...…nature of the manifestation of patriarchy within families in some racialized communities (George and Ramkissoon, 1998; Talbani and Hasanali, 2000; Rajiva, 2013) or the appropriation of and resistance to dominant discourses pertaining to sport by LGB people (Bridel and Rail, 2007) interact with…...
[...]
TL;DR: The findings provide modest support for the intersectionally inspired principle that combinations of identities derived from race, gender and nationality constitute sui generis categories in the manifestation of health outcomes.
Abstract: Objectives. We apply intersectionality theory to health inequalities in Canada by investigating whether South Asian-White health inequalities are conditioned by gender and immigrant status in a synergistic way.Design. Our dataset comprised 10 cycles (2001–2013) of the Canadian Community Health Survey. Using binary logistic regression modeling, we examined South Asian-White inequalities in self-rated health, diabetes, hypertension and asthma before and after controlling for potentially explanatory factors. Models were calculated separately in subsamples of native-born women, native-born men, immigrant women and immigrant men.Results. South Asian immigrants had higher odds of fair/poor self-rated health, diabetes and hypertension than White immigrants. Native-born South Asian men had higher odds of fair/poor self-rated health than native-born White men and native-born South Asian women had lower odds of hypertension than native-born White women. Education, household income, smoking, physical activit...
24 citations
Cites background from "“Better lives”: The transgeneration..."
...…low levels of hypertension because they more aggressively pursue Canadian cultural ideals, including ideals pertaining directly to fitness and health, perhaps as a reaction to pressure from their families to conform to traditional and gender performative roles (Sundar 2008; Rajiva 2013)....
[...]
TL;DR: In this article, Hussein's classmates in a Save the Children program to teach micro-credit to marginalized youth of Amman, Jordan, angered the trainer, who told the future entrepreneurs: "You are never going to be good businessmen, I have been teaching you all semester long to focus on your aims and goals, to ignore any distractions, and to think of yourselves only."
Abstract: (ProQuest: ... denotes non-US-ASCII text omitted.)IntroductionSave the Children Trainer: Now that you have the business plan and you have the money to implement it, your neighbors' house burned down, they have kids, and the whole family is thrown in the streets. What would you do?Hussein: Of course we would give the money to the family, there is no doubt about it. Are you asking us to think?The unanimous nods from Hussein's classmates in a Save the Children program to teach microcredit to the marginalized youth of Amman, Jordan, angered the trainer, who told the future entrepreneurs: "You are never going to be good businessmen, I have been teaching you all semester long to focus on your aims and goals, to ignore any distractions, and to think of yourselves only."1 The reprimand reflects the ideal trajectory of the creation of the neoliberal subject: the entrepreneurial (train for microcredits), individualistic (think of yourself) self who believes in the free market (focus on aims and goals). The story, however, does not stop at this point. The crux is in the response of one the trainees, who addressed the class saying:I am the son of Baqa' and my neighbor's house burns down and you are telling me I should ignore that and focus on getting my business started! To hell with you and the SMEs, I do not want to be an entrepreneur...If having my own business is going to lead me to forget my neighbors...If it is going to lead me to ignore the pain of my neighbors, I do not want to "be my own boss" [as encouraged by the trainer]. Do you know who my neighbors are? They are either my cousins, my uncles, or even brothers and sisters and you are asking me to forget about them and focus on my business...I do not need your training. We poor people survive by leaning on each other by helping each other, we live all together, not like you in West Amman [where] each lives in his own world!This local encounter highlights many of the tensions surrounding neoliberal subject creation in the context of development interventions that form the focus of this article. In the first instance, it clearly represents a local contestation of a microcredit training program and highlights the need for ethnographic research that can identify the spaces between discursive formation and on-the-ground practice, in order to understand what Ferguson (2010) refers to as the "complex relation between the intentionality of planning and the strategic intelligibility of outcomes." Governable subjects do not represent blank slates on which neoliberal processes are inscribed. Local geographic and historical contexts, social relationships, identities, and consciousnesses continue to be important in the reworking of capitalism everywhere in the world. In this case, the conflict led to the trainees leaving the class, and classes were cancelled until the director of the program intervened to resolve the dispute. Such conflicts have been the focus of a growing body of studies on the creation of neoliberal subjectivity, as discussed below.However, two further observations about this conflict are important to note. Previous studies of such conflicts have tended to focus on the role of culture in generating local contestations of neoliberal subject formation. For example, Adas (2006) notes the role of Islamic culture in generating opposition to the promotion of individualism in microcredit programs, while Karim (2001,2011) and Bernal and Grewal (2014) argue that NGO programs for women, rather than leading to the creation of neoliberal subjects, consolidated traditional forms and relationships of patriarchal power. Yet in the example above, it is not just culture, but a form of class consciousness that sparked trainee opposition to the program; in particular, trainees were committed to principles of collective solidarity and action, based on an understanding of themselves as embedded within and attached to social relationships of family, neighborhood, and the broader status of being "poor"-a status that in the Arab world is explicitly invoked as a marker of socio-economic class (Antoun 2000, Hourani, Khoury, and Wilson 2005, Khoury 2003, Parker 2009, Shryock 2000, Traboulsi 2014). …
19 citations
Cites background from "“Better lives”: The transgeneration..."
...…argue, there is a need for “richer qualitative data in studies of class identity so that researchers can explore subjects’ accounts for the ‘nuances of class identification,’ in order to avoid ‘abstract expectations’ of class identities and class awareness” (2005:12, as quoted in Rajiva 2013:16)....
[...]
...…data, it is vital to recognize that “although respondents [often fail] to raise the issue of class specifically, much of their talk about parents, education, career trajectories, family, and neighborhood [contains] information that [is] about class” (2009:281, as quoted in Rajiva 2013:19)....
[...]
26 Sep 2014
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors conducted 30 interviews with upper-middle-class Indian women in Science and Technology in Bangalore and New Delhi, India to gain insight into international career motives, repatriation and career success of Indian women.
Abstract: Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to gain insight into international career motives, repatriation and career success of Indian women in Science and Technology. Design/methodology/approach – In total, 30 semi-structured interviews were conducted with (upper) middle-class Indian women in Science and Technology in Bangalore and New Delhi, India. Findings – Thematic analysis resulted in four themes – International career motives, Theme 1: cross-cultural and scientific exposure; Repatriation reasons and experiences, Theme 2: family reunion, career prospects and readjustment; Career success, Theme 3: international experience; and career growth, Theme 4: social responsibility. Motives for international career mobility of Indian women were: exposure to foreign cultures, international collaboration in science and personal and professional development. Family formation and reunion and career prospects were reasons for repatriation and positively influenced repatriation experiences of Indian women. Readjustment...
18 citations
23 Oct 2017
TL;DR: In this paper, the role of consumption for South Asian mothers living in the UK as they incorporate motherhood into their gender identities was explored, and it was found that mothers regard motherhood as an opportunity to reflect on how they socialise their children; they develop new ways of transmitting elements of their cultural and religious heritage to their children.
Abstract: This exploratory study aims to understand the role of consumption for South Asian mothers living in the UK as they incorporate motherhood into their gender identities. Consumer research on motherhood suggests mothers’ consumption practices are intertwined with the dominant norms of good mothering that pervade many cultures, known as intensive mothering. To fulfil the norms of intensive mothering, mothers are expected to consume appropriately and devote intense amounts of effort to ensuring their child’s development, both during the transition to motherhood and beyond. However much of this research focusses predominantly on white, middle-class mothers. Relatively little is known about the consumption practices of mothers at other intersecting positions in society, such as ethnic minority women. Yet recent sociological research suggests that increasing numbers of South Asian women are transforming gender norms surrounding education, work and marriage as they negotiate access to university. This thesis seeks to understand the complex ways in which South Asian women negotiate new gender identities on becoming mothers, and the role of consumption in this process.
In-depth interviews with 23 South Asian mothers living in the UK were used to gain insight into participants’ lived experiences of becoming a mother and their everyday mothering and consumption practices. The findings show that during the transition to motherhood, there were two ways in which participants’ accounts of consuming appropriately differed from that shown in existing consumer research. First, participants typically embraced certain South Asian cultural practices surrounding birth, which meant that participants often delayed purchasing baby products until after birth. Second, participants’ consumption of expert advice was more complex, due to the higher status of advice from female family members within family hierarchies. Beyond the transition to motherhood, mothering and consumption practices such as housework, parenting, feeding the family, and childcare consumption are key sites in which many participants negotiate the norms of intensive mothering as they pursue a more egalitarian division of these responsibilities on returning to work/study.
The thesis contributes to consumer research on gender identity by how participants are positioned to challenge gender norms through their consumption practices. Participants regard motherhood as an opportunity to reflect on how they socialise their children; they develop new ways of transmitting elements of their cultural and religious heritage to their children. Rather than simply coping with these additional responsibilities, participants often view motherhood as an opportunity to socialise their children with more egalitarian gender norms.
15 citations
Cites background or result from "“Better lives”: The transgeneration..."
...Following other studies (Franceschelli and O’Brien 2015; Lindridge and Hogg 2006; Rajiva 2013), the term ‘South Asian’ includes participants of Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Sri Lankan heritage....
[...]
...Research has suggested that South Asian parents’ encouragement of their daughters’ education is ‘a given’ (Ahmad 2001; Lindridge and Hogg 2006; Rajiva 2013)....
[...]
...South Asians are not a homogenous group, and there are diverse experiences and differences across different South Asian groups (Brah 1996; Rajiva 2013)....
[...]
...‘South Asian’ is a broad term that encompasses diverse groups (Rajiva 2013), and is used in this study to refer to participants who hail from the Indian subcontinent, including India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka4....
[...]
...‘South Asian’ is a broad term that encompasses diverse groups (Rajiva 2013), and is used in this study to refer to participants who hail from the Indian subcontinent, including India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka(4)....
[...]
References
More filters
[...]
01 Jan 2012
TL;DR: The postcolonial and the post-modern: The question of agency as discussed by the authors, the question of how newness enters the world: Postmodern space, postcolonial times and the trials of cultural translation, 12.
Abstract: Acknowledgements, Introduction: Locations of culture, 1. The commitment to theory, 2. Interrogating identity: Frantz Fanon and the postcolonial prerogative, 3. The other question: Stereotype, discrimination and the discourse of colonialism, 4. Of mimicry and man: The ambivalence of colonial discourse, 5. Sly civility, 6. Signs taken for wonders: Questions of ambivalence and authority under a tree outside Delhi, May 1817, 7. Articulating the archaic: Cultural difference and colonial nonsense, 8. DissemiNation: Time, narrative and the margins of the modern nation, 9. The postcolonial and the postmodern: The question of agency, 10. By bread alone: Signs of violence in the mid-nineteenth century, 11. How newness enters the world: Postmodern space, postcolonial times and the trials of cultural translation, 12. Conclusion: 'Race', time and the revision of modernity, Notes, Index.
18,201 citations
Book•
01 Jan 1994
TL;DR: The postcolonial and the post-modern: The question of agency as mentioned in this paper, the question of how newness enters the world: Postmodern space, postcolonial times and the trials of cultural translation, 12.
Abstract: Acknowledgements, Introduction: Locations of culture, 1. The commitment to theory, 2. Interrogating identity: Frantz Fanon and the postcolonial prerogative, 3. The other question: Stereotype, discrimination and the discourse of colonialism, 4. Of mimicry and man: The ambivalence of colonial discourse, 5. Sly civility, 6. Signs taken for wonders: Questions of ambivalence and authority under a tree outside Delhi, May 1817, 7. Articulating the archaic: Cultural difference and colonial nonsense, 8. DissemiNation: Time, narrative and the margins of the modern nation, 9. The postcolonial and the postmodern: The question of agency, 10. By bread alone: Signs of violence in the mid-nineteenth century, 11. How newness enters the world: Postmodern space, postcolonial times and the trials of cultural translation, 12. Conclusion: 'Race', time and the revision of modernity, Notes, Index.
14,727 citations
953 citations
Book•
09 Mar 1989
TL;DR: A post-colonialised view of India and the West can be found in this paper, where the PSYCHOLOGY OF COLONIALISM: Sex, Age and Ideology in British India is discussed.
Abstract: PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION, PREFACE 1. THE PSYCHOLOGY OF COLONIALISM: Sex, Age and Ideology in British India 2. THE UNCOLONIALIZED MIND: A Post-Colonial View of India and the West INDEX
900 citations
Book•
01 Jan 2000
TL;DR: The Paradox of Diversity: The Construction of a Multicultural Canada and "Women of Colour" Geography Lessons: On Being an Insider/Outsider to the Canadian Nation On the Dark Side of the Nation Charles Taylor's Politics of Recognition: A Critique A Question of Silence: Reflections on Violence Against Women in Communities of Colour as mentioned in this paper
Abstract: Introduction The Paradox of Diversity: The Construction of a Multicultural Canada and "Women of Colour" Geography Lessons: On Being an Insider/Outsider to the Canadian Nation On the Dark Side of the Nation Charles Taylor's Politics of Recognition: A Critique A Question of Silence: Reflections on Violence Against Women in Communities of Colour.
650 citations