Diaspora Youth and Ancestral Homeland: British Pakistani Kashmiri Youth Visiting Kin in Pakistan and Kashmir (Muslim Minorities)

232 Pages·2006·0.62 MB·English

by  Gill Cressey

DIASPORA YOUTH AND ANCESTRAL HOMELAND
MUSLIM MINORITIES
EDITORS
Jørgen S. Nielsen(University of Birmingham)
Felice Dassetto (University of Louvain-la-Neuve)
Amira Sonbol (Georgetown University, Washington, DC)
VOLUME 5
DIASPORA YOUTH AND
ANCESTRAL HOMELAND
British Pakistani/Kashmiri Youth
Visiting Kin in Pakistan and Kashmir
BY
GILL CRESSEY
LEIDEN•BOSTON
2006
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Cressey, Gill.
Diaspora youth and ancestral homeland : British Pakistani/Kashmiri youth visiting
kin in Pakistan and Kashmir / by Gill Cressey.
p. cm. — (Muslim minorities, ISSN 1570-7571 ; v. 5)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-90-04-15346-2 (hardback : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 90-04-15346-2 (hardback : alk. paper)
1. Pakistanis—Great Britain—Ethnic identity. 2. Kashmiri (South Asian people)—
Great Britain—Ethnic identity. 3. Muslim youth—Great Britain. 4. South Asian
diaspora. 5. Children of immigrants—Great Britain. 6. Transnationalism. 7. Social
role—Great Britain. I. Title.
DA125.S57C72 2006
305.891’4122041—dc22
2006049042
ISSN 1570-7571
ISBN-13: 978-90-04-15346-2
ISBN-10: 90-04-15346-2
© Copyright 2006 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands
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Hotei Publishing, IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP.
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Dedicated to Ali Jaun Adam Kiani and to all of his friends and relations

CONTENTS
Acknowledgements ...................................................................... ix
Introduction ................................................................................ 1
Chapter One Methodology of the Study .............................. 15
Ontology and epistemology .................................................. 15
Gaze ........................................................................................ 16
Discourses and narratives ...................................................... 19
Narrative study of lives .......................................................... 24
Interviews and video diary room .......................................... 25
Young women interviewed 2003 .......................................... 26
Young men interviewed 2003 .............................................. 27
Interview schedule 11th July 2003 ........................................ 28
Interpretation and analysis of stories .................................... 31
Thematic investigation ............................................................ 32
Examples of themes/codes initially identified and later
refined .................................................................................. 35
Social research ethics ............................................................ 35
Chapter Two Journeys ............................................................ 41
Translocality ............................................................................ 42
Two-way travelling ................................................................ 44
Going over there: four weddings and a funeral .................. 46
Village: out of sight but not out of mind ............................ 49
Negotiating the borders .......................................................... 50
Change .................................................................................... 53
Chapter Three Homeland ...................................................... 55
Being ‘valayati’: what they think of us ................................ 58
Returning to Britain: back to ‘reality’ .................................. 60
Home from home from home .............................................. 62
Territory: familiar places ........................................................ 64
Chapter Four Race and Nation ............................................ 69
Immigration ............................................................................ 72
Integration and segregation .................................................. 74
viii contents
Inclusion and exclusion .......................................................... 76
Nation ...................................................................................... 78
Dual nationality ...................................................................... 80
‘Race’ ...................................................................................... 82
Immigrant relatives ................................................................ 84
Chapter Five Diaspora ............................................................ 89
Heritage .................................................................................. 95
Degrees of belonging .............................................................. 98
Chain diaspora ........................................................................ 100
Chapter Six Ummah .............................................................. 103
‘Othering’ of the Oriental Islamic World in the West ...... 103
Muslim subjectivities and Ummah ........................................ 108
Being a Muslim in the West ................................................ 112
Ummah and the current world order .................................. 116
Community: a mixed blessing .............................................. 117
Chapter Seven Gender ............................................................ 121
Gender: it’s a man’s world .................................................... 129
Chapter Eight Kin .................................................................. 139
Biraderi/family: ‘blood, soil, milk and honour’ .................. 146
The price of belonging versus the price of exclusion ........ 149
Chapter Nine Generation and Change .................................. 161
Youth ...................................................................................... 161
Education: missing out .......................................................... 172
Mixing: diverse friendships .................................................... 174
Human Rights ........................................................................ 177
Chapter Ten Language and Cultural Shift .......................... 179
Language: our language ........................................................ 179
Bilingualism and culture ........................................................ 181
Shifting future perspectives .................................................... 187
Conclusion .................................................................................. 191
Bibliography ................................................................................ 211
Index ............................................................................................ 219
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thank you to all of the young people who were interviewed for this
study; their open, frank narratives are the heart and soul of this text,
without which it would have no life.
My household and our extended families have shown great patience,
and have given practical and emotional support without which doing
this research project would have been impossible.
Staff of the former Cultural Studies and Sociology Department of
the University of Birmingham have been most supportive of the the-
oretical framing of the research, offering on-going constructive crit-
icism and feedback; particularly Dr Clive Harris. Subsequently, I
gained new insights thanks to Dr Jorgen Nielsen in the Theology
Department and gave greater attention to Islamic perspectives.
The team of which I am a member within the School of Education,
challenged me to keep my integrity as a youth and community worker
throughout the research process and rescued me from the tempta-
tions of avoiding real issues. All of my colleagues in Community,
Youth and Play Studies have been practically supportive, putting up
with my obsessive interest in this project valiantly and allowing me
space and time to dedicate to writing it up. Thanks to Bal Pooni
and young people from Broadway Youth Project for their energy
and time spent on video diary work.
Muhammad Khan has been an inspiration as a ‘study buddy’. It
has been a privilege to be accompanied in the research and writing
process by him.