Little Bangladesh

Voices from America

Zahir Ahmed

• Publisher: Routledge India
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000419030
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Public Policy
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This volume presents a comprehensive overview of the Bangladeshi diaspora in USA. Based on case studies from across Southern California, it discusses themes such as economic advantages of migration beyond sociological models of globalization; Bangladeshi diaspora and Little Bangladesh; oral histories of settlement and incoming migrants; imagined homelands in California; emigration and immigration; trans-business and the American Dream; diaspora and social media; Islam and transnationalism; and Bangladeshi Islam in the USA. It explores the trans-global subjectivity and embodied experiences of Bangladeshi migrants as they negotiate economic opportunity, security, and challenges. The book also documents transnational ties that migrants retain; the aspirations and anxieties they face; and what it means to be a Muslim living in the USA in the post-9/11 era.

With its rich, multi-sited ethnographic narratives set in transnational studies and studies of globalization, this book will interest scholars and researchers of diaspora studies, migration studies, South Asian studies, political sociology, social anthropology, sociology and political studies, international relations and those interested in Bangladesh.

1
Settlement of the Bangladeshis in the US

On the move: A historical background

My study of the Bangladeshi diaspora in Southern California should be placed within the broader historical trends of Bangladeshi migration to the United States. Historically, Bangladeshi people – who were treated as ‘Indian’ during colonial rule in undivided India, and after 1947 as ‘East Pakistani,’ and only since Bangladesh’s independence in 1971 as ‘Bangladeshi’ – have been mobile, both within and across shifting political borders (Kibria 2007; Gardner and Ahmed, 2006; Ahmad 2011). Within the fragile geographical locations, people moved from West to East Bengal in order to secure their livelihoods. Environmental uncertainty in the region produced what Ranabir Samaddar (1999) calls, ‘an insecure environment, inhabited by insecure families.’ In this way, human movement acted and still acts as a livelihood strategy for searching for dreams in new frontiers. According to Samaddar (1999: 83–87), ‘this dream has made Bangladesh a land of fast footed people, people who would not accept the loss of their dream, who would move on to newer and newer lands.’ Samaddar’s observations appear true if we look back at the history of movement of the Bangladeshi people in different trajectories of their lives. So, movement between and within different places, be this of people or things across geographical space, have become the characteristic features of the Bangladeshi people. Let me briefly discuss this trend, in order to contextualize the scene of contemporary Bangladeshi migration into the US.

Bangladeshi people travel in different directions both internally and overseas,¹ predominantly to the Gulf and Southeast Asia.² The number of travelers is huge. Siddiqui (2003) estimates that from 1976 to 2002 official figures show that over three million Bangladeshis migrated overseas, mostly on short-term contracts.

Interestingly, the choice of migration to various foreign countries is not the same for everyone; it depends upon who is migrating and from what socio-economic and educational backgrounds. In the case of the Middle East, some of the people on the move are middle-class professionals, but the vast majority are wage laborers, often working in the most vulnerable and lowly paid sectors of the international labor market. With respect to UK migration, the majority come from the northern part of Bangladesh, especially the district of Sylhet, utilizing long-lasting kinship ties to settle down there (Gardner and Osella 2003). In the US, however, migration has no such distinct character. It is diverse and multifaceted. Immigrants to the US are from different districts, have different backgrounds, and are in different phases of life and life circumstances.

The first migrants to the US can be traced back to 1763. Sir Edward Ryan’s mission to North America laid the groundwork to bring slaves from Chittagong and Assam to produce tea in regions such as Georgia and Pennsylvania. Later, these slaves were shifted to cotton-growing plantations in the south and the West Indies (http://www.dakbangla.50megs.com/usabangali.htm).

A second wave occurred in 1780, when the United States started exporting furs to China. Through the journey to Calcutta for loading jute and cotton goods bound for New York, Boston, and Savannah, some locals from Chittagong, Noakhali, and Sylhet were hired to work as cheap laborers on the ships back home. A similar process of recruiting sailors (lascars) – predominantly from Sylhet – was used by the British.³

Historical data show that during the late 1800s, some Bengali shipmates (sareng) ended up in the docks of East London or in the New York port (Guhathakurta and Van Schendel 2013). Isolated from their families for years at sea, they had decided to search for new employment opportunities in new mainland sites (http://www.dakbangla.50megs.com/usabangali.htm). All Bengalis who arrived in America between 1880 and 1950 were said to be settlers with no skills. These settlers journeyed from New York to Toledo, Detroit, and other parts of the Midwest, and later to California (ibid.). Ferrying goods and selling ice cream from door to door were their main livelihoods.

Another wave of Bengali settlers arrived in America soon after World War II. Bengal had been partitioned into East Bengal under Pakistan and West Bengal under India in 1947. The partition forced the Bengali seamen to search for new opportunities, and many of them moved on to the US to escape poverty. Their main aim was to settle in this new place. The Immigration Act of 1921 enabled non-Americans, including the Bengalis, to become legal immigrants by marrying US citizens.

In 2011, I heard a story of a legendary immigrant man (popularly known as Chacha, or ‘uncle’) in Long Beach. He had come in the late 1960s or early 1970s as a shipmate, married a black American woman, and thus acquired US citizenship. He was credited with bringing about 150 relatives here. He died in 2009 while visiting his home village in Noakhali in Bangladesh. In today’s terminology, immigrants like Chacha are ‘transnationals’ par excellence: they have settled and worked in the US, but stayed in touch with their ‘home of origin’ as often as they could via their kinship and community networks.

During the early Pakistan period in the mid-1950s, a new wave of migration, what Jones (2006) calls ‘significant immigration waves,’ occurred. In the 1960s, just prior to Bangladesh’s independence, many people from erstwhile East Pakistan fled to the United States to avoid political persecution or, in the case of religious minorities, religious discrimination (Bangladeshi Americans, https://www.everyculture.com/multi/A-Br/Bangladeshi-Americans.html). These immigrants included the first generation of Bengali students, doctors, and other affluent persons.⁴

After the independence of Bangladesh in 1971, a new pattern of immigration was established. Under the leadership of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Bangladesh had gained independence from Pakistan. This phase is considered the first organized period of immigration of Bangladeshis to the United States. Jones estimates that the number of immigrants from Bangladesh has increased annually ever since then. In 1973, 154 Bangladeshi immigrants arrived in the United States; in 1974, 147; in 1975, 404; and in 1976, 590. These immigrants were mostly younger males who were leaving behind the hard economic and political times in Bangladesh. Looking for a better livelihood and seeking political asylum were the main reasons for these immigrants to move. Most lived and worked in places such as New York, New Jersey, Washington, and California, finding employment in salaried jobs. They constitute the successful Bangladeshi migrants in the US today.

By the 1980s, this pattern of immigration had been established, and the stage was set for larger numbers of professionals to immigrate to the United States. They had spread to every state of the country as well as concentrating in the urban areas of New York, New Jersey, and California. Many of these immigrants were engineers, doctors, teachers, graduates and post-graduate students, who became professionals, and many of the remaining two-thirds were white-collar workers. Jones evaluates the situation this way:

These trained professionals, seeking a better life in America, created a brain drain for Bangladesh, adding to that country's difficulties in establishing itself. This first wave of Bangladeshi immigrants was young, between 10 and 39 years old, and more than 60 percent male.

(2006: 3)

Crucially, a growing number started to bring their wives and children to the United States. This shift was partly the result of changing immigration laws. It also reflected wider changes in Bengali-concentrated areas such as California, New York, New Jersey, Atlanta, Texas, and Washington – areas in which mosques, shops selling halal meat, and other community facilities were becoming increasingly available. Today we see Bangladeshi civic organizations in every state in the US, established by these immigrants, who tend to keep up their Bengali ethnic identity.

Family reunification

The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 represented a significant watershed moment in Asian American history. The Act abolished the restrictive National Origins system originally passed in 1924 in favor of a quota and preference system. Priority was now given to ‘family reunification,’ so that US citizens and permanent residents could sponsor their family members.

Prior to the 1960s, immigration to the US was regulated by the provisions of the National Origins system. Between 1881 and 1917, about 7,000 Asian Indians had entered this country. The 1924 immigration law prohibited Asians from settling in the US. Karen Leonard (2008), a pioneer in conducting studies on South Asians in California, has estimated that some 2,400 Asian Indians settled in agricultural areas in California by marrying local women of Mexican origin during that period.

The significant Bangladeshi migration that continues today, then, began in the 1980s. Under the legal framework of the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act, many Bangladeshis entered the US under family reunification arrangements rather than on the basis of occupational skills. In 1996, about 771 Bangladeshis entered under employer-based preferences. Conversely, under family reunification schemes, 8,221 Bangladeshis came during the same period. Immigration data signal a shift from occupational skill to family reunification as the basis of the large increase in overall numbers of Bangladeshi immigrants.

The 2004 Statistical Abstract of the US estimates that the number of Bangladeshi immigrants increased significantly from 1971 to 2002. During this period, about 93,900 foreign-born Bangladeshis were admitted to the US. This influx led to shifts in socio-economic and cultural aspects of immigrant communities of different states, including New York and California.

The 1965 Act had several consequences for American society. The most significant was that South Asians, including Bangladeshis, established several ‘emer...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Endorsement Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Foreword
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: Settlement of the Bangladeshis in the US
• Chapter 2: Multi-sited ethnography and the Bangladeshi diaspora
• Chapter 3: Southern California ethnographies
• Chapter 4: Bangladeshi diaspora in New York City
• Chapter 5: Movement across Desh and Bidesh
• Chapter 6: Islam and transnationalism
• Conclusions: Diaspora, travel and connectedness
• Glossary
• References
• index