Which am I, truly?

A thoughtful and insightful article by Raywat. I think this is relevant to anyone who has ever questioned their identity. Indeed, it is difficult to find your own Identity when so many are forcibly placed upon you. My passport says I am British, My mother tells me I`m Tamil and according to my relatives back home I am a Brahmin.

As second- or third-generation immigrants to the Caribbean, your folks have lost touch with the social structure in India. In addition, as you admit you don`t have even linguistic ties anymore.

As for the Carribean Indians, I do not think they are so far removed from the Indian social structure. I have met many Carribean and South American Indians who are happy enough to boast about their origins in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and anywhere else in North India but, reluctantly shy away from their more Southern Madras and Kerala origins which ironically reflects the northern/southern divide which exists in India today. A Guyanese woman once told me that she didn`t believe I was South Indian because my skin was fairer than it should be!

Wanting to be accepted as Indian is neither necessary or even beneficial for the Guyanese Indians since it was prejudice within India which led many of them to a life of Indentured servitude. However, if they want to be called Indian they should be proud of their Southern, dark-skinned peasant origins as well as their snowy-complexioned Bollywood ideals.

A thoughtful and insightful article by Raywat. I think this is relevant to anyone who has ever questioned their identity. Indeed, it is difficult to find your own Identity when so many are forcibly placed upon you. My passport says I am British, My mother tells me I`m Tamil and according to my relatives back home I am a Brahmin.

As second- or third-generation immigrants to the Caribbean, your folks have lost touch with the social structure in India. In addition, as you admit you don`t have even linguistic ties anymore.

As for the Carribean Indians, I do not think they are so far removed from the Indian social structure. I have met many Carribean and South American Indians who are happy enough to boast about their origins in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and anywhere else in North India but, reluctantly shy away from their more Southern Madras and Kerala origins which ironically reflects the northern/southern divide which exists in India today. A Guyanese woman once told me that she didn`t believe I was South Indian because my skin was fairer than it should be!

Wanting to be accepted as Indian is neither necessary or even beneficial for the Guyanese Indians since it was prejudice within India which led many of them to a life of Indentured servitude. However, if they want to be called Indian they should be proud of their Southern, dark-skinned peasant origins as well as their snowy-complexioned Bollywood ideals.

Raywat,

You mentioned that Indo-Caribbean immigrants don`t find acceptance from Indian immigrants to Canada.

This is probably due to several different factors. I found that my French room-mate in college had nothing good to say about the French-Canadians, going to the extent of ridiculing their language. The same thing goes for Indian Tamils who look down on Sri Lankan or Malaysian Tamils.

As second- or third-generation immigrants to the Caribbean, your folks have lost touch with the social structure in India. In addition, as you admit you don`t have even linguistic ties anymore. So to most Indians, you are a strange species whom they cannot classify easily as they tend to do among themselves. You aren`t a Bihari, a Bengali, a UP-wallah.. so who are you? How do we conveniently pigeon-hole you in one of our mental compartments?

I don`t think it is that different with the current generation of immigrants to the UK. I think folks back home in India have difficulty classifying them... but at least in their case, the fast air transportation system enables them to stay in touch with their home base in India and maintain cultural and family continuity which was denied your people.

Yet another dimension may be the fact that most Caribbean immigrants went there as indentured laborers. Today`s Indians have no understanding of how hard it was for your ancestors. To them, life is easy with an H1-B visa and a $75,000 a year job as a code coolie in Silicon Valley, a Honda Accord in the garage, and weekly phone calls to Mummy and Daddy in India. Their worldview won`t agree with yours and they probably don`t even want to know what 19th century India or Caribbean was like. What Marina Carter calls ``coolitude`` -- the experiences of the first generation workers together with those of their descendants spread across the Caribbean, Pacific and Indian Ocean islands today -- is different for you and for them. However, they will realize that later that it is coolitude for them too!

PS. One must admit that this feeling of disconnectedness between the Diaspora Indians and today`s Indians cut both ways. One needs no better evidence for this than Naipaul`s books ``An Area of Darkness`` and ``A Wounded Civilization``.

Ref jang #7

[as a fob grad-student, i met a trinidadian girl in college and was totally bowled over with her style, cool accent, and strage spelling for her name. In real india, one did not meet such self-assured dark-skinned girls; there they (used to) develop kind of repressed.]

Blame it on the cultural milieu rather than just being dark-skinned. In India girls are brought up to be submissive, though that is changing now. You will see girls of various complexions asserting themselves in today`s India because the society has changed so much. Of course I am not talking about the BIMARU states here.

Saminasha#20

~~Why pretend that one group identity is more important than another? That one group identity is ``purer`` or more ``truthful`` or ``ethnically authentic`` than another?~~

Who pretends that?

I did not understand the rest of your post.

Harimau

I will look out for it thanks.

Ref PunjabiZulu #12

[soysauce

~~The blacks and the indians together should have fused their identities into one common identity - caribbean. Would it be incorrect to say it`s indian racism that has plagued indian immigrants everywhere, from africa to the americas? Look in the mirror first.~~

Do you know much about Trinidad?]

He cannot locate Trinidad on a map. He is desperately trying to curry favor with someone -- anyone.

The people who talk about Indian racism -- I am waiting to see the look on their faces when their daughters bring home an African-American boyfriend. Karo-kari would be mild compared to what the likes of Soysauce would do to their daughters if they should step so much as an inch out of line.

Ref Saminasha #1, kaurasach #2 and PunjabiZulu #3

Please check out Marina Carter`s books on Indian migration to Mauritius.

``Does it negate the legitimate desire of sections of society to assert their group identity as they wish to? ``

Why pretend that one group identity is more important than another? That one group identity is ``purer`` or more ``truthful`` or ``ethnically authentic`` than another?

Again, the more interesting questions are about how ``Dotheads`` see themselves as opposed to ``Dotbusters`` as opposed to ``Osama-wannabes`` as opposed to ``Abcds`` as opposed to ``American Born Constructionworker Desi Elucidating Financial Growths Happening In Knowledgemaking Jargon Largely...`` as opposed to ``BJP Surburanites`` as opposed to ``Irshad Ahmediites who are somehow benefitting from Western Hegemony...``

there is nothing wrong with eating tandoori chicken three times a week, but you don`t have to lick your fingers in public because that`s how you did it in bhatinda or gojra - it is disgusting, and doesn`t serve any purpose .............

OK, I don`t get this at all. If some desis want to use forks and spoons and knives and daggers and cannons and air craft carriers to eat their food, fine by me. If some Westerner feels ``disgusted`` to see a desi licking his finger, again, fine by me. However it seems very slavish when a desi gives advice like this to other desis. What is this nonsense about ``serving purpose``? Since when is the way you eat your food supposed to serve purpose? If you find it disgusting, look away. There are many things Westerners do that may seem disgusting to us. Eating meat at all would be considered disgusting in some parts of India. Does that mean all westerners who work in India should stop eating meat?

In the end, I think it boils down to what you yourself are comfortable with. I dont lick my fingers, be it at home, in a restaurant in India or wherever. I will not alter my habits just to conform to somebody else`s idea of what is disgusting or not. Similarly a person who licks his fingers in Bhatinda should feel free to do it in Brooklyn too.

As a parting note, from whatever I have seen and heard of American cultural norms, it seems as if licking your own fingers in public is disgusting, but licking someone else`s fingers is not. ;-)

let me put some yeast in this sheermal of identity and enthnicyty -- for khameer purposes

at the cellualr level we and the yeast are like brother and sisters -- both of us use the same biochemical makeup to look pretty -- in fact the Yeast are more PIOUS more religious than us the sinful humans --

they don`t use dirty SEX to fill the room with THEIR yeast babies...

so to the question who we really are ? -- the answer at the cellualr level -- WE ALL ARE YEAST of Fungal Ethnicity in one from or the other .....

let the yeasts of the world unite....

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zulu,

...... there is nothing wrong with trying to assert your ``group identity``, but you would look rather funny if you were to walk around central park wearing a leopard skin and ostrich feathers ............there is nothing wrong with eating tandoori chicken three times a week, but you don`t have to lick your fingers in public because that`s how you did it in bhatinda or gojra - it is disgusting, and doesn`t serve any purpose ............. we desis (and zulus) needlessly tend to romanticize our ``native`` cultures which are nothing more than a figment of our imagination ................. i`d rather have beef tenderloin any day instead of tandoori chicken and there is nothing romantic about having a leopard chase you even if you manage to kill it and wear his skin ............. it is silly ................ i know, i know all about nostalgia and ennui and homesickness and identity crisis - but it is all made up stuff .......... get over it, or take the next boat back !

............ pat buchanan was right - it is not easy to assimilate zulus in brooklyn ..............

A good beginning anyway. Please read the following with an open heart as well an open mind. The tone is deliberately blunt but the anguish is deep & heartfelt.

The very fact that you have to ask this is an indication that you are:

culturally confused, materially marooned, intellectually exiled, and spiritually shanghied. You are listing in the foggy doldrums clutching a roadmap to the white cliffs of Dover only.

Blood is thicker than water--but you believe in dissing your own kind. Language, food, and attire is another overt way to express bond & solidarity with your own kind but you prefer to hang around the outlets of the pirates who not only robbed you of your wealth but also exacted the last drop of your sweat and blood to cushion their coffers...and then educated you how to pass on your indebtedness to them to your progeny.

You have signed away your DNAs for a bondage in perpetuity but believe that it is an annuity.You will never know where you are if you keep forgetting or feigning to forget from where & when you came from.

Chacha chusni suffered such mental indignations as well but that was much much before the ruination and destruction of the towers of Babylon2 and the confounding of languages.

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soysauce

~~The blacks and the indians together should have fused their identities into one common identity - caribbean. Would it be incorrect to say it`s indian racism that has plagued indian immigrants everywhere, from africa to the americas? Look in the mirror first.~~

Do you know much about Trinidad?

saminasha

Paki is a racist term analogous to Nigger in the lexicon of white racists in Britain and Canada to refer to all Brown people. In Britain there are strong fissiparious tensions amongst South Asians to separate their identities: in short, some Indians do not want to be associated with Pakistanis anymore, and some Pakistanis assert the primacy of their religious identity over any kinship with Hindus and Sikhs. I reckon in two or three generations desi`s in England will be polarised as much as they are in the sub-continent. But I do not neccessarily view this as a bad thing. If people feel that their identities are not being accorded the prominence they feel they deserve it is their right to group together as they please. This is the nature of the modern western multi-cultural model.

The trouble with people who always go on about ``the need`` to ``interrogate`` ``received identities`` is that it does not respect the fact that identity politics, especially to religious and racial minorities in the west, provides comfort and succour to many people, and the observation that identities are a construct is nothing more than a statement of the obvious. So what? So this is a construct, identity is fluid, things are not black and white...I agree, but what is the point? Does it negate the legitimate desire of sections of society to assert their group identity as they wish to?

Raywat,

Your article brings to light an important point of our daily life. What exactly am I?

Going over our life, we find our definition changing all the time...defined by the company we are in at the moment.

Among college mates we are northies/southies/bengalis, etc. Among southies we are kannada, telugu, etc. Among kannada we are brahmins, vaishyas, shudras, etc. Among one major caste, we are one of hundred sub-castes...and so on, and on. Inside the sub-sub-caste, we are short-tall, dark-fair skinned, rich-poor, healthy-sick, etc.

In a party, we are adult, teenager, old man.

In a gym, we are skinny, budding muscles or musclebound.

On chowk, we are indian-pak-bangla. Among indians we are Hindu-muslim-sikh, etc. Among hindu we are left wing,right wing, etc.

- - - - -

So...we belong to a hundred different circles of classification. These circles intersect, envelope other circles. Don`t you feel that too? That your identity is changing with the company you are in.

If you`re trying to nail down your exact circle...clearly that`s an impossibility since the pertinent circle is changing all the time...depending on the context of the identification.

(...unless off course you`re satisfied of being inside the largest circle them all...that of human beings...yaaawnnn...that enough philosophy for today!)

It`s unfair to expect us indians to embrace you as one of our own. Why isn`t caribbean identity enough for you?
Fijian indians are fijian and indian first and foremost. It`s this dual wishy-washy identity that has alienated them from the native fijians and made their position precarious. The blacks and the indians together should have fused their identities into one common identity - caribbean. Would it be incorrect to say it`s indian racism that has plagued indian immigrants everywhere, from africa to the americas? Look in the mirror first.

The more interesting question to ask here is how is race constructed?

What are the criteria of being ``Indo-Guyanese``, ``Keralan Indian``, ``Pakistani`` etc.? At that very level, the construct is questionable; do all Indo-Guyanese cook roti, perform namaz or puja and ``Wiine down low?``

Do all immigrant Keralans disagree with the ideals of the entity of Kerala?

Can one ``perform`` as a Pakistani regardless of if one is in Nazimabad or Newark? Does a performance that enacts all the cultural ideals that make one ``Pakistani`` necessarily mean that all Pakistanis perform the same actions? Do all Pakistanis think and act the same way?
What happens if a Pakistani is not Muslim, but Buddhist? Does that make him/her a ``non authentic`` Pakistani? A ``traitorous`` Pakistani?

The idea that identity is neatly contained and labelled is a rather simplistic one-which is when one reads warnings against being ``too`` whatever-we need to question what that whitewashing brush means exactly.

Raywat,

Is this your first article on chowk?
It was very nicely written. Thanks for sharing your experiences as immigrant in N America.

Let me add here...
I think it is the lot of any immigrant anywhere in the world to go through such hardships related to ethnic identitiy. Had we come to this land as conquerors, perhaps it would have been the other way around. It seems to be the way of the world...

Adios

as a fob grad-student, i met a trinidadian girl in college and was totally bowled over with her style, cool accent, and strage spelling for her name. In real india, one did not meet such self-assured dark-skinned girls; there they (used to) develop kind of repressed.

Then there are those Pondichery Tamil immigrants from france in Qubec.

I think to qualify as Indian, you must eat Paan. Do the Guayanees eat Pan?

Raywat:

…we Indo-Caribbean types often suffer rejection from ``true`` Indians from the subcontinent, though we are apparently similar enough to share the same epithet and insults…

…welcome to our house specialty!…back in the home country we are no less charitable…;)

…search for true identity is at best a mirage … a fleeing perception…depending on whim and need we can cross any box on the form…we are what we want to be, we are what they want us to be, we are what we ought to be, we are what…....for the three score and ten…and then ashes or dust…

rgds,

t

Raywat,

You bring up a subject very important to the desis who grew up in the West...

Now, from my experiene, I feel that one has to be comfortable with his/her own identity. It really doesn’t matter where is it that you have the need to “belong”. What matters is what runs in your blood. Your culuture is what runs in your blood: you can take yourself out of the culture, but you cannot take the culture out of you.

Be comfortable with yourself. We live in a world where physical boundaries don’t exist anymore. In the last 30 years, when I first arrived in America as a teenager, I’ve seen a seismic shift that is unimaginable if one has not experienced it. We now live in an instant-communication world. The taunts, the spiteful looks, the “go back to your country” epithet are all gone. In the twentyfirst century America (can’t really speak for Canada or other European countries) that does not hold true anymore. And that derogatory “Paki” you talk about, I never experienced it, so I don’t know anything about it. However, Since this term seems to be directed to ALL subcontinent people, it is even more reason for the subcontinent people to protect each other and not be at each other’s throat all the time. The use of the term ``Paki`` indicates that all subcontinent people are perceived the same way; their nationalities, their ethnicities and their religions do not even matter to the outside, contemptuous world.

Be at peace with yourself. Know who you are and be comfortable with it. Go with the flow. Know what runs in your blood, not what your skin looks like. Those desis who want to be “White” are deeply complexed. They are ashamed of who they are. They are wannabees. Get out of that. Be you. Be cool. That’s the only way to live.

An article that expresses almost every immigrants experience to varying degrees. Carribean, Mauritius and Fiji had a large number of immigrants from eastern UP and Bihar, and the word ``Phagwah`` or ``Phaag`` for Holi is still used in todays UP and Bihar amongst the uneducated lot. The subtle racialism is alive and well in Canada but compared to UK and southern USA, it is pretty harmless and limited to a very small minority. While Carribean Indians have forgotten Hindi, the older generation, specially the ones i had the opportunity to meet in Victoria, Mauritius were delighted to communicate in avadhi with a peculiar sing-song Creole accent.

Brilliant article Raywat. I really enjoyed reading it. It was sensitive, attuned, insightful and informative. I had some knowledge of the Indo-Carribean community but you really made me feel as though I understand some of the aspects and contradictions in this identity after reading your article.

The Indian Diaspora extends from the Carribean to Great Britain to Canada, the USA and Africa...the stories and complex histories of these foreign born Indians and their relationship to the ``Motherland``, and their religious and cultural identities, are going to be one the great narratives of Indian literature in the future. And Raywat has extended our understanding of one aspect of this experience so well by writing this article.

Anyone want to discuss Naipaul and his relationship with Trinidad?

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A great essay.

There are several interesting points here; the overlap of the term ``Paki`` to corral all diasporic South Asians into one suspicious category, the moments of ``ethnic recognition`` in our encounters, that we all seem to practice the ceremonies and siginifications of our ethnic identity in almost separate psychic places. What does it mean to be part of the diaspora?

Secondly, the labor/class aspect of South Asian West Indians is an important one. The reasons/exigencies that forced many Indians to the Carribbean as indentured workers and the lives of South Asians in Trinidad, Guyana and Jamaiica is part of this discourse.

Welcome Author!