Johannesburg: Indian migrants in North America and South Africa fear that pursuing their cultural and religious identity in foreign lands could lead to their marginalisation, a top Indian-origin professor has said.
"North American citizens in Canada and the US face the same dilemma of their ethnic of their cultural and religious roots affecting their identity. I got a sense of gloom in
talking to people in Durban," Amritjit Singh, Langston Hughes Professor of English at Ohio University, US said.
Singh was speaking on a book being researched in conjunction with two other academics titled "South Asians in America, 1700-2000: A Documentary History." The talk was
organised by the Centre for Indian Studies in South Africa at Wits University.
"As in North America, there is a fear and anxiety about the future of their children. There are those who felt that pushing an Indian agenda would lead to the marginalisation of their community."
Singh said, it was quite possible though to forge identities within a broader landscape wherever Indians found themselves.
There were a number of similarities between the issues faced by Indian migrants to North America and those in South Africa, Singh said.
PTI
First Published: Tuesday, February 16, 2010, 00:20