Virtual Homelands: Indian Immigrants and Online Cultures in the United States

Introduction: Recasting Home

Introduction Recasting Home VirtualHomelands:IndianImmigrantsandOnlineCulturesintheUnitedStatesis astudyofthetextual,institutional,anddiscursive politicsofonlinemediathat target,speakto,andare shapedbyIndianimmigrantcultures.Thebook’smain emphasisisontheideaofhome,anditsmanyreconfigurationsonlinethrough the concept of the homepage. It critically evaluates how homepages anchor the ideals and ideologies of belonging online in relation to two dominant imaginaries traditionally associated with the time-space of the home—namely, the domestic, familial household and the public, national homeland. Thecentralcontentionofthisstudyisthatthedevelopmentandpopularization of online media as technologies of digital capital, virtual communication, andtransnationale-commercehaveengenderedthehomepageasacrucialsite for Indian immigrants living in the United States to reimagine their identities, desires,andpoliticsaroundself,community,citizenship,andtransnationalbelonging . Therefore, the book argues that online media play a crucial role in the ongoingstrugglesoverbelongingandcitizenshipfordiversegroupswithinthe IndianAmericancommunitybyrepresenting,reconstructing,andreimagining the Indian immigrant household and homeland (which include India and/or the United States).1 WhiletheideaofamonolithicIndianAmericancommunityisahegemonic and an idealized construct, it continues to be reinforced in many mainstream narratives of online media industries and cultures in the United States and in India.However,therearemultipleothernarrativesthrivingonlinethatpointto 2 introduction the diverse political, social, and cultural realities of immigrant subjects. Hence onlinemediaspacesoffercriticalperspectivesintothecontinuingcirculationof categories thathistoricallyhave beenassociatedwithIndianimmigrantsinthe UnitedStates—includingIndianAmericans(U.S.citizensofIndianethnicity), but also nonresident Indians (NRIs; Indian citizens living abroad), persons of Indian origin (PIOs; not legal citizens of India, but they maintain cultural affiliation ), and South Asian Americans (a larger collective of U.S. citizens and residents from the South Asian region). Important to note here is that while these categories might have been embedded within state discourses and legal policies, their usage and circulation within community discourses have always blurredthelinesbetweentheofficiallydemarcatedcategories.Forinstance,using the terms NRI, Indian American, and Indian immigrant interchangeably is very common online, thereby suggesting tensions between state agendas and public imaginations of community as well as the prescribed and lived realities of the everyday. Hegemonic ideologies about the family and citizenship are being increasingly reconfigured online to make them interoperable with the transnational contextsofmediaandimmigration.Atthesametime,alternativeimaginations of the private home as a site of un-belonging and of the public nation as a site for struggles over cultural citizenship reveal the constructed nature of idealized representations of Indian immigrants as “wired” nonresident Indians.2 As Indian immigrants recast household and homeland online, they testify to the imbrication of public agents—such as the state, the law, and the immigration system—in cultures of the domestic, the private, the familial. Forexample,therearemanywebsites,blogs,socialmediaspaces,andmobile media platforms that claim to represent the interests of the global Indian community at large, while others target the interests of a specific subgroup, such as H-1BIndianprofessionalslivingintheUnitedStates.Whilethelatterrepresent a specific, and often elite, section of the Indian immigrant community in the United States, their hegemonic location within dominant discourses about Indianimmigrants’senseofbelongingisforegroundedthroughthealternative but critical representations of gender, class, and labor relations in the community at large. Similarly, the meanings of Indian American cultural locations imaginedonlinearerecastbySouthAsianAmericanactivistorganizationssuch as DRUM (Desis Rising up and Moving), SAWNET (South Asian Women’s NETwork), and SAALT (South Asian Americans Leading Together), which usenewmediatechnologiestoprovidealternativenarrativesofbelongingbased on coalitions across race, gender, class, age, region, and religion or nationality. 3 Recasting Home These online reconfigurations of who or what is included within the Indian immigrant community point to a larger argument that underpins this book; namely,thatonlinemediaofferanunprecedentedspaceforIndianimmigrants torepresentthemselves,establishtheirvisibility,andhelpsettheirowncultural agendas. More importantly, online media become the very sites where the politics and cultural struggles over representation, visibility, and power relations are engendered, mediated, and contingently played out. It is precisely at this intersection—of the politics of Indian immigrant belonging and the new modalitiesof beingand becomingat home inthenetwork era—that this book seeks to make its contribution. Specifically, through a series of case studies, this book investigates how the homepage, a primary unit of identification in online media, emerges as a powerful metaphor for transnational belonging for Indian immigrants. While the literal and symbolic meanings attached to the notion of being “at home” in the immigrant landscape have been addressed within studies of the Indian and the South Asian diasporic communities, this study explores how homepages illuminate the dynamic and shifting nature of immigrant politics and cultural citizenship.Withtheemergenceofnetworkingtechnologies,e-commerce,and online communications since the 1990s, the technological literacy of Indian immigrantshasincreasinglycrystallizedaroundtheideaofbeing“athome”online . Similarly, in current media discussions in the United States about the role of social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube—and the way they are transforming long-standing distinctions between inside and outside, publicandprivate,thehomeandtheworld,thedomesticandtheforeign—the tech-savvy Indian immigrant remains a very powerful force.3 ThesenarrativesspanIndianAmericanmediaandtheIndianandU.S.mainstream press and are built around several recurring themes: the...