Abstract
- Welche Selbstrepräsentationen entwickeln Inderinnen und Inder der zweiten Generation in der Schweiz angesichts ihrer translokalen Erfahrungen?
Having multiple cultural backgrounds and moving
in translocal networks, second generation Indians have to negotiate and
translate contradictory sets of identity and alterity. In Switzerland they are,
on the one hand, signified within the regimes of assimilation and commercial
multiculturalism, and, on the other hand, they face often cultural and social expectations
of their parents and the diasporic community. Interacting with their relatives
and friends in India and being part of the greater Indian public they are
confronted with competing discourses of „India” and the “West” within which
they have to negotiate their role as NRI („non-resident Indian“). These
processes take place against the background of the increasing presence of
“India” in the Swiss public sphere (i.e. Bollywood, Yoga, etc.) and an Indian
diaspora policy, which propagates the image of a “global Indian family” in a
postcolonial economic race. This PhD-project aims to understand the subjectivities
of second generation Indians in this context and it tries to show how they are dependent
on institutional settings, social processes and cultural practices. To tackle
the sketched subject biographic and ethnographic methods are utilized.
Detailed project description (PDF, 175 KB)
