Dissertation
SARBAT DA BHALA: SIKH IMMIGRANTS AND THE PROSPERITY OF THE MULTITUDE
Washington State University
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Washington State University
12/2024
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.7273/000007222
Abstract
This project aims to investigate the role of cultural values in community building within the Sikh diaspora in the US and the potential for cooperation with other immigrant groups
through the lens of Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri’s theory of the multitude. Indians are lauded as a ‘model minority’, but the immigration stories of Sikh Punjabis are often different to that of the high-skilled Indian immigrant that is frequently the focus of scholarship. My research aims to centre these stories and to investigate how the values inherent to the community enable the networks necessary for the success of these individuals. Given the history of the Sikh community, throughout which they have been forced to fight against different kinds of oppression –as well as chosen to fight for the rights of others–, the purpose of this project was to investigate the ways in which these values translate to their situation in the diaspora and whether they facilitate their cooperation with other immigrant communities, particularly the Latinx community, due to already existing precedents and cultural similarities.
Since the purpose of this project was, from its very inception, to centre the voices of the Sikh community to make them authors, rather than subjects, in this study, I designed a survey through which to gather the perspectives of the members of the community on the three distinct but interconnected aspects of their experience: how the Sikh identity is embraced, transformed or challenged in the diaspora; in what ways the Sikhi praxis plays a role in their socio-economic success and the ways in which their bioproduction reflects Sikh values, and; their sociopolitical involvement and the potentiality for cooperation between Sikhs and other immigrant communities. This project has attempted to offer a platform for Sikhs containing a multitude of intersecting identities to voice their unique lived experience. Through the interplay of subjectivities of each participant, a picture was formed; sometimes in line with the expectations of the project, and often in a different, surprising way.
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Details
- Title
- SARBAT DA BHALA
- Creators
- Begona De Quintana Lasa
- Contributors
- Carmen R Lugo-Lugo (Chair)Vilma Navarro-Daniels (Committee Member)Samuel Ginsburg (Committee Member)
- Awarding Institution
- Washington State University
- Academic Unit
- Graduate Program in American Studies and Culture
- Theses and Dissertations
- Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Washington State University
- Publisher
- Washington State University
- Number of pages
- 156
- Identifiers
- 99901195537601842
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Dissertation