Overview of Ethnoscapes!!Thus far, we have covered three of the five “global flows” that Arjun Appadurai identified in hiswritings. In this module, we will address the flow of people — human migration around the globe– and some of the cultural implications. To review Appadurai’s definition from Modernity atLarge:!!By “ethnoscape,” I mean the landscape of persons who constitute the shifting world in which welive: tourists, immigrants, refugees, exiles, guest workers, and other moving groups and personsconstitute an essential feature of the world, and appear to affect the politics of and betweennations to a hitherto unprecedented degree. This is not to say that there are not anywhererelatively stable communities and networks, of kinship, of friendship, of work and of leisure, aswell as of birth, residence and other filiative forms. But that is not to say that the warp of thesestabilities is everywhere shot through with the woof of human motion, as more persons andgroups deal with the realities of having to move, or the fantasies of wanting to move. What ismore, both these realities as well as these fantasies now function on larger scales, as men andwomen from villages in India think not just of moving to Poona or Madras, but of moving toDubai and Houston, and refugees from Sri Lanka find themselves in South India as well as inCanada, just as the Hmong are driven to London as well as to Philadelphia. And as internationalcapital shifts its needs, as production and technology generate different needs, as nation-statesshift their policies on refugee populations, these moving groups can never afford to let theirimaginations rest too long, even if they wished to.!In other words, more people are moving around, more often, and further than ever before. Theplace-based networks that previously bound humans to one another — residence in the samevillage, city, or country, for example — have less meaning now as the process of establishingroots in a place is so often followed by uprooting and moving.!!But what are some of the factors that have driven mass migrations in the past? And how havethey helped shape the ethnoscapes that exist today?!!Contemporary Migration in Context!Human migration is a phenomenon that is as old as modern mankind — homo sapiens. There isscientific evidence that as early as 160,000 years ago, humans began moving great distancesacross Africa, likely in order to find food and other basic needs. Migration out of Africa to othercontinents began approximately 70,000 years ago.!!Much later, recorded history tells us that people moved around to find optimal sites for farmingand trade, to establish communities, and for exploration. Some complex societies with greaterdivisions of labor relied on slaves drawn from communities of less powerful people both nearand far. Slaves were sometimes collected from imperial colonies, especially in Africa. TheAtlantic slave trade, in which individuals were captured in Africa and transported to the NewWorld, began in the 16th century and lasted until it was outlawed in the 19th century. Thistransportation of slave labor constituted an early mass migration from Africa to various sites inEurope and the Americas.!Industrialization in the 18th century hastened the pace and extent of migration. New commercialoperations required mass labor, which attracted workers from rural areas and overseas. Forexample, workers from China (mostly men) were recruited to work in Cuban sugar caneplantations as well as on the United States’ first transcontinental railroad. Some returned to theirhomeland after their contracts and indentured servitude ended, but many also stayed, formingthe bases of Chinese communities in those countries.!!War, and especially violence targeted at particular ethnic groups, can also prompt migration,both within nations and transnationally. During World War II, for example, the Nazi regimegathered Jews and other enemies from its occupied territories throughout Europe and movedthem to concentration camps. These actions, and war in general, created a shift in thepopulation. While many were killed, others also found safety in other parts of the continent andoutside of Europe altogether.!Still other, natural forces can have a dramatic effect on populations. Favorable climates andgeography can draw settlers just as drought, flooding, earthquakes, volcanoes and other naturalevents can push people away. The Cape Verde Islands, off of the west coast of Africa, hasexperienced a major population loss over the last century due to climate change. Decreasingamounts of rain eventually made farming impossible and living conditions extremely difficult. Asa result, over half of Cape Verde’s citizenship currently lives overseas, primarily in thenortheastern U.S., Portugal, the Netherlands, and Angola.!!What distinguishes migration today from that of past eras is the frequency and rapidity withwhich people move about the globe. Advances in technologies of travel and communicationmake it easier to find out about job opportunities overseas and easier to physically go.Moreover, technology makes it easier for individuals to transmit funds internationally, so it isfeasible to live in one country and support family in another.!!Please view the video Understanding Global Migration. Produced by the Macarthur Foundation,this video provides an overview of the phenomenon and identifies some current issuespertaining to global migrants.!Diasporic Profile: Indians Abroad!!To better understand transnational migration today, let us take a closer look at a particular groupthat is moving around the world in greater numbers than ever before: Indians. Today, more than22 million Indians live in more than 100 countries around the world. While Arjun Appadurai(himself of Indian descent) refers in his writing to contemporary human migrations, it isimportant to understand these current ethnoscapes in historical context.!!Before the 19th century, and before there was a nation called “India,” migration around theIndian Ocean had been a relatively common undertaking for people of the Indian subcontinent.However, the colonization of India by British interests in the 18th century would prompt massmigrations to sites all over the globe. The English East India Company established exclusivetrade with India in 1757, which began the colonization process. In 1858, the British governmentbegan ruling India directly.!Over the course of Britain’s dominion over India, the empire expanded, colonizing otherterritories around the world. The empire included places as far-flung as Canada and theThirteen (American) Colonies, Egypt, South Africa, and Burma. Each of these locations wascolonized for a strategic purpose — either to lay claim to its natural resources, agriculture,people, or its proximity to other desirable sites. British colonies in the Caribbean were importantsites of agriculture (especially sugar cane and tobacco) but were also convenient way stationsfor ships transporting slaves from Africa to the New World. The slave trade was a major sourceof income for the British Empire from the 16th to the early 19th century, when the trade of slaveswas outlawed by Britain and the importation of slaves was deemed unconstitutional in theUnited States.!This did not render slavery itself illegal, and the British Empire began looking to its own coloniesto provide labor for its many commercial enterprises. The size of India’s population and therelative poverty there made it a prime source of labor. Millions of Indians accepted indenturedservitude and were exported to Fiji, Trinidad, Guyana, Surinam, Maritius, Malaysia, and otherBritish colonial plantations. In this way, the Indian diaspora began to spread more widely acrossthe globe.!The Partition of the Subcontinent!By the early 20th century, two factors had emerged contributing to the mass migration of Indianpeople. First, an Indian independence movement began resisting colonial rule, which eventuallyled to the independence of the subcontinent in 1947. Second, there were tensions betweenMuslims and Hindus, which had been growing over the course of the colonial period.Independence provided an opportunity for two separate countries to emerge on thesubcontinent to encompass the two predominant worldviews at the time. Pakistan would be areligious state governed by the rules of Islam and would become home to Muslims. India wouldbe a secular state and home to Hindus.!!In the Indian Independence Act of 1947, the British government delineated the geographicaldivisions between these two factions. Pakistan would be carved out of two areas to the east andwest of India.!!The months leading up to the partition of India were bloody as tensions between Muslims andHindus erupted in riots and other violence. About one million people died in the conflict, andthousands of others were injured or otherwise left suffering. Finally, in August 1947, the massmigration began. In what is believed to be the largest single human migration, some 15 millionpeople were uprooted and displaced. Traveling by train, foot, or any other means available,refugees relocated to their newly designated homes.!The awkward division between West and East Pakistan created some administrative difficulties.Not only was it difficult to govern two separate locales, but there were growing charges ofinequity between the two regions. Civil unrest developed into civil war, and East Pakistanseceded in 1971, renaming itself Bangladesh. This caused an exodus of an estimated 10 millionrefuges from Bangladesh to the eastern parts of India. Once again, the population of thesubcontinent underwent a massive shift.!Late 20th-Century Migration!During the second half of the 20th century, the Indian diaspora underwent another significantshift. As the nations colonized by the European empires gained their independence, some ofthese locations became economically unstable and otherwise inhospitable, prompting asecondary migration of ethnic Indians. One of the most notable emigrations was from Ugandaafter Idi Amin attained power in a military coup in 1972. Claiming that he had been instructed byGod, Amin expelled all Indians — about 80,000 — from the country. Most of those expelled wentto the United Kingdom, where they were granted asylum. Although they were not forced to leaveother African nations, rising nationalist sentiment in Kenya, Tanzania, and Mozambiqueprompted the emigration of ethnic Indians from those countries. Approximately 70,000 Indiansrelocated from Mozambique to Portugal.!!Opportunities for financial gain in the Persian Gulf began drawing laborers from India in the1970s and have continued to do so to the present day. In 2008, it was estimated that 4.5 millionIndians were living in the gulf countries, mostly in the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.!The development of the information technology (IT) industry has accounted for the emigration ofmany Indians and the growth of the country’s economy. Opportunities in the United States haveprovided platforms for Indians to create their own businesses and boost employment andproduction in India. The facility of transportation, communication, and high-tech production hascreated an environment in which opportunity can transcend geographical distance and culturaldifferences.!The Culture of Mobility!We have reviewed some of the reasons why migration has occurred historically. The push ofviolence, unfavorable leadership, poverty, public policies, and even climate is paired with thepull of opportunity, safety, and survival, causing shifts in the contours of ethnoscapes.!!The increasingly commonplace movement of people from place to place suggests an ease ofmobility and a certain comfort level with dislocation and adaptation. However, the reality ofrelocation is often tempered with yearning for “home.” Indeed, some assert that Appadurai’swritings about global flows diminish the importance of nations and localities, when thesecategories do play an important role in the way people and communities identify themselves andeach other. There is natural tension between the nomadism in the contemporary world and thehuman desire for a sense of place and belonging.!!Self-titled “global nomads” who may have rich international experiences that enhance their viewof the world may lack a sense of “home” — an emotional connection to a particular place. Thishas been the observation of travel writer Pico Iyer, whose work examines the mixed experienceof being cosmopolitan. Drawing from his own personal experiences of being born in India butraised in England and the U.S., Iyer describes some of the challenges of living with an identityfractured by migration: “The hope of a Global Soul, always, is that he can make the collection ofhis selves something greater than the whole; that diversity can leave him not a dissonance but ahigher symphony.”!Here, Iyer suggests that constant mobility perpetuates within the migrant an internal divide,driving a constant search for ways to unify one’s disparate parts.!!Artistic Production!Given the prevalence of migration, it is only natural to find artistic production inspired by thesubject.!!!!!Mona Hatoum!!Known for making simple, powerful sculptures with multiple meanings, Mona Hatoum oftenderives inspiration from her own experience as a global nomad. Raised by a Palestinian familyin Lebanon, Hatoum now lives and works in Berlin. While it is tempting to try and read hercultural background into her work, more resonant are universal themes of migration, travel, anddislocation. Globe, for instance, consists of a large, round sculpture made of rebar that mimicslines of latitude and longitude. Typical of Hatoum’s practice, Globe incorporates layers ofmeaning that are sometimes conflicting. While globes usually conjure notions of travel andexploration, Hatoum’s sculpture is also reminiscent of a cage and incarceration. It marries thedual and seemingly contradictory themes of mobility and confinement.!!Traffic, which consists of two suitcases joined by a lock of human hair, makes use of the multiplemeanings of the word “traffic.” It simultaneously suggests transportation and trade; in particular,the illegal practice of human trafficking. Initially, the piece seems innocuous. However, uponcloser examination, the disembodied lock of hair suggests something more sinister.!!Mitra Tabrizian!!Photographer Mitra Tabrizian creates images that address themes of migration, exile, alienation,identity, and belonging. As an Iranian living in London, she has drawn upon her experience asan outsider in creating images of expatriates.!!Her 2005-06 series Border features large-scale color photographs that portray Iranian exiles invarious solitary settings. Depicted alone and looking off into the distance, the subjects appearalienated from their adoptive society. Her photographs have the appearance of film stills, whichreflects her interest in Iranian cinema. Depicting real subjects that are carefully staged, thephotographs also straddle the line between reality and fiction. Although the protagonists ofBorder are known to be Iranian, the non-specific settings in which they are posed has auniversalizing effect on the story of men and women making new lives in unfamiliar places.!!Artistic Production!!epón Osorio!!Pepón Osorio is interested in the material culture of immigrant life and uses it in his sculpturesand installations. Originally from Puerto Rico, Osorio moved to New York as a young adult. Hispersonal experience as a migrant and his professional experience as a case worker for the NewYork Department of Human Services connected him to the Puerto Rican community in his SouthBronx neighborhood. His job also yielded stories that would inspire his artwork. Osorioexplained his process in the online essay “The Practices and Pedagogy of Pepón Osorio” asfollows:!!I am conveying stories about my personal experience based on other people’s stories. It is asthough I am channeling community stories or collective experience — it is mine but it alsobelongs to other people and I can filter it through my creative lens.!Osorio favors elaborate installations that envelop viewers, placing them in the shoes of PuertoRicans living in New York. Badge of Honor features two adjacent environments representing thebedroom of a teenage boy and the jail cell of his estranged father. Videos projected on to thewall present each subject speaking to the other, articulating hopes, dreams, anddisappointments. The jail cell, in its sparseness, is the opposite of the boy’s bedroom, which isthe picture of material excess. In this way, Osorio represents the physical and ideological dividebetween the two.!!En la Barberia No Se Llora (No Crying in the Barbershop) similarly incorporates the viewer.Originally installed in an abandoned shop, the piece was a fantastical recreation of a PuertoRican barbershop, a haven of masculinity. Adorned with references to Puerto Rican culture,including photographs, religious articles, and Spanish text, the installation served as aframework for the stories of immigrant men. A chair festooned with flags, baseballs, and othertrappings of masculinity served as the centerpiece. A small television affixed to the headrestplayed videos of men reminiscing about personal experiences.
