This volume brings into focus a range of emergent issues related to women in the Indian diaspora. The conditions propelling women’s migration and their experiences during the process of migration and settlement have always been different and very specific to them. Standing ‘in-between’ the two worlds of origin and adoption, women tend to experience dialectic tensions between freedom and subjugation, but they often use this space to assert independence, and to redefine their roles and perceptions of self. The central idea in this volume is to understand women’s agency in addressing and redressing the complex issues faced by them; in restructuring the cultural formats of patriarchy and gender relations; managing the emerging conflicts over what is to be transmitted to the following generations,; renegotiating their domestic roles and embracing new professional and educational successes; and adjusting to the institutional structures of the host state. The essays included in the volume discuss women in the Indian diaspora from multidisciplinary perspectives involving social, economic, cultural, and political aspects. Such an effort privileges diasporic women’s experiences and perspectives in the academia and among policy makers.

This book describes the processes of migration and settlement of indentured Indian women and tries to map their struggles, challenges and agencies. It highlights the fact that even though indentured women faced various kinds of violence and abuse owing to the authoritarian and patriarchal setup of the plantations, over a period of time, they managed to turn the adverse circumstances to their advantage. They struggled to emerge as productive workforces and empowered themselves through acquiring education and skill, and negotiating new spaces and identities for themselves. At the same time, they also raised families in often inhospitable circumstances, passing on to their descendants, a strong foundation to build successful lives for themselves.The book discusses indentured women from a multidisciplinary perspective and adopts multiple methodologies, including primary and secondary sources, personal narrations, pictorial representations and theoretical discussions. It also provides an overview of the current discourses and the changing paradigms of the studies on Indian indentured women. Further, it presents a detailed, region-wise description of indentured women migrants. The regions covered in this book are Asia- Pacific (countries covered are Fiji, Burma and Nepal); Africa (countries covered are South Africa, Mauritius and Reunion Island); and the Caribbean (countries covered are Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago). In addition, one full section of the book is devoted to the theoretical frameworks that touch upon gender performativity, normative misogyny, Bahadur's Coolie Women, literary representations and resistance movements. It is intended for academics and researches in the field of diaspora/migration/transnational studies, history, sociology, literature, women/gender studies, as well as policymakers and general readers interested in the personal experiences of women and migrants.

A riveting family portrait of four generations of Jewish women from Calcutta.

Desi Dreams focuses on the construction of self and identity by Indian immigrant professional and semi-professional women who live and work in the US. The focus in this anthropological fieldwork is on Indian immigrants in the San Francisco Bay Area. They have often been defined as a model minority. Indian immigrant women who have achieved entry into the current technology based economy in the Silicon Valley value the capital-accumulation, status-transformation, socio-economic autonomy, and renegotiation of familial gender relations that are made possible by their employment. However, this quintessential American success story conceals the psychic costs of uneasy Americanization, long drawn out gender battles, and incessant cross-cultural journeys of selves and identities. The outcome is a diasporic identity through the recomposition of Indian culture in the diaspora and strengthening of transnational ties to India.

Reflecting the continuing interest in the diaspora and transnationalism, this collection of critical essays is located at the intersection of gender and diaspora studies, exploring the multiple ways in which the literature of the Indian diaspora negotiates, interprets and performs gender within established and emerging ethnic spaces. Based on current theories of diaspora, as well as feminist and queer studies, this collection focuses on close textual interpretation framed by cultural and literary theory. Targeted at both academic and general readers interested in gender and diaspora, as well as Indian literature, this collection is an eclectic selection of works by both established academics and emerging scholars from different parts of the world and with diverse backgrounds. It brings together multiple approaches to the predicament of belonging and the creation of identities, while showcasing the range and depth of the Indian diaspora and the diversity of its literary productions.

Domicile and Diaspora investigates geographies of home and identity for Anglo-Indian women in the 50 years before and after Indian independence in 1947. The first book to study the Anglo-Indian community past and present, in India, Britain and Australia. The first book by a geographer to focus on a community of mixed descent. Investigates geographies of home and identity for Anglo-Indian women in the 50 years before and after Indian independence in 1947. Draws on interviews and focus groups with over 150 Anglo-Indians, as well as archival research. Makes a distinctive contribution to debates about home, identity, hybridity, migration and diaspora.

In recent years, interest in the large group of skilled immigrants coming from India to the United States has soared. However, this immigration is seen as being overwhelmingly male. Female migrants are depicted either as family migrants following in the path chosen by men, or as victims of desperation, forced into the migrant path due to economic exigencies. This book investigates the work trajectories and related assimilation experiences of independent Indian women who have chosen their own migratory pathways in the United States. The links between individual experiences and the macro trends of women, work, immigration and feminism are explored. The authors use historical records, previously unpublished gender disaggregate immigration data, and interviews with Indian women who have migrated to the US in every decade since the 1960s to demonstrate that independent migration among Indian women has a long and substantial history. Their status as skilled independent migrants can represent a relatively privileged and empowered choice. However, their working lives intersect with the gender constraints of labor markets in both India and the US. Vijaya and Biswas argue that their experiences of being relatively empowered, yet pushing against gender constraints in two different environments, can provide a unique perspective to the immigrant assimilation narrative and comparative gender dynamics in the global political economy. Casting light on a hidden, but steady, stream within the large group of skilled immigrants to the United States from India, this book will be of interest to researchers in the fields of political economy, anthropology, and sociology, including migration, race, class, ethnic and gender studies, as well as Asian studies.