Becoming Men in a Modern City: Masculinity, Migration And
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© COPYRIGHT by Harjant S. Gill 2012 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED DEDICATION To my dear friend Abhishek Sharma and to Chandigarh, the city I grew up loving, where I always find myself at home. BECOMING MEN IN A MODERN CITY: MASCULINITY, MIGRATION AND GLOBALIZATION IN NORTH INDIA BY Harjant S. Gill ABSTRACT This dissertation explores the formation of contemporary Punjabi Sikh masculinity in North India. Through fifteen months of fieldwork carried out in Chandigarh, the capital city of Punjab, I look at how young Punjabi men belonging to landowning Jat Sikh families develop notions of masculinity and migration. In addition to the traditional gender norm Punjabi men are expected to follow such as getting an arranged marriage, having kids, and supporting their families, most of the men I interviewed characterized successful masculinity as the ability to migrate abroad and become transnational citizens. Over the last three decades the trend towards transnational migration has grown exponentially among Punjabi Jats. Punjabi families view migration as the quickest path to financial prosperity and middle class status. Countries with large concentrations of diasporic communities such as Canada, the United State, United Kingdom and Australia often top the list of preferred destinations for Punjabi migrants. In addition to seeking better educational and employment opportunities abroad, the Punjabi Sikh desire to leave India is partly rooted in ongoing economic and political marginalization experienced by the Punjabi Sikh community within India. iv In this dissertation, I chronicle the experiences of young Punjabi men who give up farming and move to Chandigarh to gain the language and technical training necessary to apply for a study abroad as well as skilled worker visas. Their families were actively involved in making the decision send their sons abroad, at times selling parts of their land to finance HIS educational training and to access other migration related services in Chandigarh. The family supports their son’s aspirations in hopes of realizing the benefits later of transnational migration through remittances and migration opportunities for other family members. Chandigarh, a city known for its modernist architecture and its postcolonial legacy, is perceived by the young men as a knowledge society where they can learn English and other technical skills that would help enhance their migration opportunities. The city represented a temporary destination in these men’s over all journeys out of India. My research examined the time they spent in Chandigarh, ranging anywhere from four months to three years. I started by exploring how the young men interact with the unfamiliar landscape of the modernist city. For most of these men, the move to Chandigarh was their first time living away from their families. This transition from the village to city offered new opportunities for fraternal bonding, exploring their sexualities and developing a sense of masculine selfhood. These men often spent their free time hanging out in the Chandigarh main shopping plaza and watching Punjabi films and idolizing their favorite Punjabi heroes. I looked at how the men underwent a series of coming of age rituals as part of the overall process of becoming a man. I discovered that for most of the young men, the reason their v definition of successful masculinity hinged on being able to migrate abroad was because it allowed them the type of independence and financial success that they felt they could not attain by staying in India. In defining contemporary notions of successful Punjabi masculinity as characterized through mobility and transnational migration, this dissertation also offers a more nuanced understanding of gender relations in migration and migration related processes. I conclude by arguing that access to transnational mobility provides Punjabi Jat men with disproportionate amount of power in Punjabi society, as these men enjoy caste and gender-based privileges that include being able to move between rural, urban and transnational spaces in ways that are largely foreclosed to women. vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I want to begin my thanking all my family, friends and colleagues for their ongoing encouragement and support throughout my doctoral studies. To my advisor Dr. David Vine I want to say thank you for believing in me and for your consistent guidance, wisdom, feedback and support both personally and professionally. To Dr. Geoffrey Burkhart and Professor Leena Jayaswal, thank you for your direction, advice and support throughout the process of researching and writing this dissertation. I also want to thank Dr. Debarati Sen for your feedback and guidance. To my dad, thank you for your invaluable advice and support. To my mom, thank you for your encouragement and for being such powerful role model. I would like to thank the following individuals for their guidance and feedback throughout the research process and on various drafts of this dissertation: Dr. William Leap, Dr. Inderpal Grewal, Dr. Doris Jakobsh, Dr. Nicola Mooney, Dr. Margaret Walton- Roberts, Dr. Radhika Chopra, Prof. Shohini Ghosh, Dr. Shalina Mehta, Dr. Kamool Abbi, Dr. Rajinder Dudrah, Dr. Virinder Kalra, Dr. Brett Williams and Dr. Cymene Howe. I also want to thank Point Foundation and my mentor Jeff Pluth for supporting me throughout my doctoral studies. I would like to thank Jamia Millia Islamia University’s AJK Mass Communication research center in New Delhi for supporting the research for Chapter 5 of this dissertation and for giving me access to their library and archival materials. This research would not have been possible without the help of following individuals: Gaurav Sangwan, Robb Selander, Karamjeet Singh Brar, Sumit Baudh, vii Gaurav Sogi, Satinderjeet Singh and Ramal Sood. Thank you to my dear friends Michelle Marzullo, Conner Krone, Dylan Kerrigan and Anndell Quintero for reading my rough drafts and giving me valuable feedback. Thank you to my brother Sunny Gill for your support throughout the writing phase of this dissertation. To my partner Nick Geboy, thank you for your love, patience and encouragement while I undertook the insurmountable task of writing a dissertation. I also want to thank my dear friend Abhishek Sharma with whom I rediscover Chandigarh and to whom I dedicate this ethnography. Thank you for being my companion throughout fieldwork. I will always remember our lengthy discussions about Chandigarh during our strolls through Sector 17. Above all, I want to thank all of my research participants and their family members. Thank for sharing your stories, memories and experiences. viii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................................... iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .......................................................................................................... vii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS ........................................................................................................ xii CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................... 1 Border Crossings ..................................................................................................... 1 Theorizing Masculinities ........................................................................................ 7 Masculinity as a Social Status ................................................................................. 8 Performing Masculinities ...................................................................................... 14 Formation of Historical Punjabi and Sikh Masculinities ...................................... 19 Marginalizing Sikh Masculinity ........................................................................... 28 Contemporary Punjab ........................................................................................... 35 National Borders, Transnational Movement ......................................................... 39 Recent Histories of Migration ............................................................................... 43 Contemporary Migration from Punjab .................................................................. 46 Steps and Stops Along the Way ............................................................................ 50 Summary of Chapters ........................................................................................... 51 Contribution to South Asian Masculinities ........................................................... 53 CHAPTER 2 CHANDIGARH ........................................................................................ 55 Encountering Modernity and Post Modernity ....................................................... 55 The Architect’s Chandigarh .................................................................................. 62 Chandigarh as the North Indian Knowledge Society ............................................ 73 ix Participants ............................................................................................................ 78 Setting ................................................................................................................... 81 Timeline and Methodology ................................................................................... 87 NRI – Ethnographer .............................................................................................. 89 CHAPTER 3 BECOMING MEN IN CHANDIGARH ..................................................