Migrant Middle: Revealing the South-Asian Diaspora through Community Making in Shrewsbury

Abstract

Recent quantitative data shows that the American suburb is rapidly diversifying, prompting the question: How is American space produced, and who is producing it? The South-Asian diaspora represents 2.2 percent of the total American population and has significantly contributed to the American cultural, economic, and political landscape. To understand the South-Asian diaspora in the context of Shrewsbury, a suburb located in Massachusetts, this thesis uses an ethnographic study to weave together patterns of transnational migration, identity, and everyday culture through the lens of the South-Asian community. Stories and investigations of the temporal relationships between diaspora and the built environment reveal that the architecture of everyday South-Asian life is internalized and distributed throughout the region. Migrant Middle proposes an alternative reading of the American suburb, not as an auto-centric place defined by its spatial boundaries but rather considered as a heterogeneous, regional network. How might (or not) a regional mobility strategy enhance connectivity and more prominently reveal the South-Asian diaspora?