Interrogating Intersectionality: Contemporary Globalisation and Racialised Gendering in the Lives of Highly Educated South Asian Americans and their Children

Abstract

This paper examines the fit of the intersectionality framework for understanding transnational lives. The data for this paper is drawn from my research on South Asian migrants to America and their children, the 1.5 and 2nd generation. I focus on these highly educated migrants and their children and their efforts to maintain meaningful family ties and live religions in a context that spans the USA and selected South Asian countries. I use this data to assess whether the intersectionality approach is able to explain lives that span ‘real’ and ‘virtual’ social worlds. I show that the intersectionality approach needs to be deepened to capture simultaneous experiences of privilege and marginalisation across national and transnational contexts.