MONEY, MIGRATION, and FAMILY India to Australia

MONEY, MIGRATION, AND FAMILY India to Australia SUPRIYA SINGH Money, Migration, and Family Supriya Singh Money, Migration, and Family India to Australia Supriya Singh Graduate School of Business and Law RMIT University Melbourne , Victoria , Australia ISBN 978-1-137-55716-2 ISBN 978-1-137-54886-3 (eBook) DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54886-3 Library of Congress Control Number: 2016947983 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2016 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifi cally the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfi lms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specifi c statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. Cover illustration: © Arun Roisri Printed on acid-free paper This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by Springer Nature The registered company is Nature America Inc. New York ALSO BY SUP RIYA SINGH Bank Negara Malaysia: The First 25 Years, 1959-1984 (1984, Kuala Lumpur: Bank Negara Malaysia). On the Sulu Sea. (1984, Kuala Lumpur: Angsana Publications). The Bankers: Australia’s Leading Bankers Talk About Banking Today. (1991, North Sydney: Allen & Unwin Australia Pty Ltd.). Marriage Money: The Social Shaping of Money in Marriage and Banking. (1997, St. Leonards, NSW: Allen & Unwin). Migration, Belonging and the Nation State. (2010, edited with Alperhan Babacan as the fi rst editor, Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing). The Girls Ate Last. (2013, Eltham, VIC: Angsana Publications). Globalizatiion and Money: A Global South Perspective. (2013, Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefi eld). Searching for Community: Melbourne to Delhi. (2015. Edited with Nadarajah, Y., Mulligan, M., & Chamberlain, C. Delhi: Manohar Publishers). v PREF ACE The stories of migrants and their families in India and Australia tell of loss and separation. They are also stories of intense family connection via communication and the sending of money. Between the late 1960s and 2014, money and communication have become more reciprocal. Today, migration is experienced as mobility rather than settlement. Ideas of family have been re-imagined in Australia and India to provide care for the children and older people. These themes are intertwined in the real stories of migrants and their families across life stages. I followed some migrants and their families across India and Australia to capture the emotional experience of migration of those who moved and others who stayed behind. The stories of migrants to Australia between the late 1960s and mid-1990s differ from those of the recent migrants who came from the mid-1990s. Placing these stories side by side reveals the signifi cance of the changes over fi ve decades of Indian migration to Australia. The changes are dramatic, particularly when I view them across my personal migration history. For me, migration to Australia was a two-step journey from India to Malaysia in the late 1960s and then to Australia in the late 1980s. When I was in Malaysia and Australia, money only went in one direction and that was to India. My family was not fi nancially able to send money to me. But foreign exchange restrictions would also have prevented it even if it were possible. Today migrants still send money home. But money also comes from India to Australia for education, housing, business and when parents move to stay with their children. As India’s economy opened and grew vii viii PREFACE in the 1990s, the middle class became richer. Foreign exchange restrictions have loosened. Australian migration policy also changed in the late 1990s. Education in Australia became a possible pathway to migration. So increasingly, recent migrants have had to pay for education in order to have the possibility of migration. Student migrants come as temporary residents unlike the earlier migrants who came with permanent residence visas. Earlier migrants came to settle. Recent migrants remain for long periods in a state of precarious mobility. They hope to settle but only if conditions are suitable for themselves and their families. An important change has happened with the decreasing cost of connection via the mobile phone, the Internet and online applications and travel. I remember in the late 1960s when I moved from India to Malaysia the only communication was via an air letter form. It took at least a month to hear back and so many things remained unsaid. Telegrams and telephones often told of death. One froze at the ring of the telephone at night across time zones. But today migrants ring up to ask how much turmeric to put in the lentils. Grandchildren speak with grandparents. The minutiae of daily life are shared. Things still remain unsaid at times, even though there is con- stant interaction. These silences sometimes only get fi lled when family visits. These changes in money and communication have taken place along parallel tracks. But when money becomes global, its characteristics change. In the transnational family, the quantum of money is approximated against care rather than calculated in terms of number. A dollar sent means less than the dollar received when communication is patchy and slow. It is valued less than the physical care given or not given. When both sides of the family across borders communicate frequently and instantaneously, they know the sacrifi ce behind money sent and received. Then the dollar received is valued more than the dollar sent. These stories reveal that money sent home, migration and the transnational family are the most personal dimensions of globalization. Sending or receiving money to or from families in India is our experience of money travelling instantaneously across borders. The diffusion of the transnational family across continents is how many of us experience global networks. Entwined with it is the notion of being Indian and being Australian, living lives across India and Australia. Supriya Singh Graduate School of Business and Law RMIT University Melbourne , VIC , Australia ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am beholden to the Indian migrants and their families who spoke of how migration and money shaped their family relationships. Some stories were hard to tell as they spoke of hurts and aborted relationships. At other times, it was a celebration of a continuity of relationship as they shared their lives with me. Their stories took me from Melbourne and Sydney to many of the cities, towns and villages mainly in Punjab on buses, taxis and motorcycles along roads and mud paths across fi elds. Meeting the migrants and their families and briefl y being part of lives extended my world leaving me humbled by their trust and friendship. With some, fi eld- work led to a continuing connection and friendship as I joined the dots between migrants and their families across India and Australia. I hope they can recognize themselves and place their experiences against the major changes in Indian migration to Australia across fi ve decades. The writing of this book drew on long friendships and intellectual relationships in Australia and round the world. Lyn Richards read two versions of the manuscript. Intellectual engagement with her over the structure and content made me remember she has been doing this for me for close to 25 years when I started my PhD with her. She read the second version of the manuscript on a cold winter’s weekend, rugged up with kangaroos looking at her from outside her window. Anuja Cabraal is a friend, colleague and student and was part of the fi rst phase of the study. We learnt a lot about each other as we worked together. It is a relationship that has continued after her research went in a different direction in the last fi ve years. She read the whole manuscript and I was comforted to know it was true to her memory of the part of the project we had shared. ix x ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Margaret Jackson read it for me as a colleague and friend with an out- sider’s perspective leading me to clarify what I had taken for granted in Indian culture. Jan Pahl has been part of my intellectual and personal life and she read part of the manuscript. Her questions led me to further think- ing and clarifi cation. I am particularly grateful to Loretta Baldassar for reading the manuscript because her work on different strands of Australian migration has infl uenced part of the framework of the book. And Perle Besserman gave me feedback as one writer and friend to another. Jasvinder Sidhu read relevant excerpts relating to sensitive issues con- fronting the Indian community in Australia. Catherine Gomes read three chapters dealing with communication, settlement and mobility, sparking a lively exchange of ideas across generations. I also had expert reviews from colleagues at RMIT and round the world on Chap. 6 where I write of money, communication and care. Viviana Zelizer, Bill Maurer, Keith Hart, Heather Horst and Raelene Wilding read the chapter suggesting further references and engaging with me in a global discussion.

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