Introduction: Deconstructing the (Re)construction of South Asian Identities in Canada

Published Spring 2014

In May 2011 the International Migration Research Centre at Wilfrid Laurier University (Canada) hosted a conference on South Asian migration. It was organized as an interdisciplinary gathering with support from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. Margaret Walton-Roberts and Simon Chilvers were the principal organizers. While most research papers (a total of 60) were contributed by scholars based in North America and Western Europe, 14 came from the South Asian region itself.

The event’s premise was that research on South Asian migration increasingly required interdisciplinary and transnational collaboration (and still does). Major aims were to “take stock” of topics being explored and identify significant new areas of research. Prominent discussions included (1) how to adequately conceptualize factors determining acts of migration; (2) different types of migration (e.g., internal, international, temporary, permanent, etc.) and their connections; (3) changing spaces and scales of citizenship claims; (4) developmental roles performed by overseas South Asians in the subcontinent; and (5) how distinctive intra- and intergenerational identities were reproduced, yet evidently with considerable flux in different conjunctures.

This special issue of Diaspora presents a selection of articles concerned with the last theme, with an emphasis on how contemporary South Asian communities in Canada are actively reconstituting their collective identities. The purpose of this introduction is to supply a brief background context and highlight significant commonalities and divergences between authors.

The history of South Asian migration to Canada can be traced (at least) to 1867, when different British North American colonies were federated. The origins and formation of diasporic communities can be considered inseparable from the elevated position of Canada within the empire: that is, as a predominantly white-European-settler society. South Asians were subalterns: economically (as laboring classes), politically (being disenfranchised), and culturally (by representing “lower races”). After independence was granted to newly formed states in South Asia, some important changes were registered in Canada. By 1967, many precepts concerning South Asians appeared to have undergone a revolution. Officially, legal barriers to intercommunity equality were removed. A new discourse of “multiculturalism” replaced that of domination.

Whether any change subsequently occurred in relative life opportunities for diasporic populations is perhaps the axis around which many varied debates revolve. All of the included articles can be read as impinging upon this metaquestion—whether they concern diasporic sensibilities, atypical living arrangements, or interactions with other “Canadians.” (Though, it can critically be noted, none seek to document claims of inequality, nor consider how other communities might be fractured.)

Explicitly, a common refrain is how contradictions within South Asian diasporic communities relate to a changing world outside of Canada. The articles are especially sensitive to how populations have used broader discourses concerning the subcontinent itself. We believe that, in this respect and others, the selection offers readers some noteworthy empirical details and theoretical insights.

Superficially, the contributions may appear quite specific—and perhaps even unduly restricted. In their details, the articles mainly focus on particular linguistic communities, with “religion” often foregrounded. There is little in the way of comparative methods; authors have largely preferred what might be termed an “ethnographic” idiom. While all the authors are anxious not to reinforce insular and powerful stereotypes about South Asians in Canada, some things must be mentioned here to situate this intellectual approach.

First, “South Asian,” as the lead article stresses, is a quite peculiar construct in Canada. It has been partly engineered by communities themselves, but increasingly it is also the preferred affix of officialdom. Many in Canada, informally, claim more specific origins and group labels. A majority identify with Punjabi, Tamil, or Bengali heritages. Such commonplace references to “linguistic-regions” meshes with subcontinental administrative practice (e.g., with many States of the Indian Union established this way). Yet profound historic reasons also exist for these groups (and their political-cum-religious debates) being most prominent. Notably, these areas were among those most tightly woven into the fabric of colonial state-making. Furthermore, significantly, many of their “ancestral” claims still remain unresolved (e.g., in relation to Partition).

Second...