Stanley I. Thangaraj
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- September 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814770351
- eISBN:
- 9780814762974
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814770351.003.0004
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology
South Asian American identity is not formed against the dominant white normative masculinity alone. This chapter looks at how the racialization of South Asian Americans as “nerds” also leads to a ...
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South Asian American identity is not formed against the dominant white normative masculinity alone. This chapter looks at how the racialization of South Asian Americans as “nerds” also leads to a passing into various racial and ethnic categories. This passing is a gendered phenomenon based on a certain racial ambiguity that poses South Asian American men, like African American men, as innately athletic and dangerous to the nation and sport. South Asian Americans play in the Asian American and Latino basketball leagues while pushing the boundaries of both categories even as they are excluded from the realm of hero-making; African American men are not allowed in as frequently and they face tremendous policing. This chapter highlights the ways in which race, blackness, and masculinity are shaped through South Asian American racial ambiguity.Less
South Asian American identity is not formed against the dominant white normative masculinity alone. This chapter looks at how the racialization of South Asian Americans as “nerds” also leads to a passing into various racial and ethnic categories. This passing is a gendered phenomenon based on a certain racial ambiguity that poses South Asian American men, like African American men, as innately athletic and dangerous to the nation and sport. South Asian Americans play in the Asian American and Latino basketball leagues while pushing the boundaries of both categories even as they are excluded from the realm of hero-making; African American men are not allowed in as frequently and they face tremendous policing. This chapter highlights the ways in which race, blackness, and masculinity are shaped through South Asian American racial ambiguity.
Stanley I. Thangaraj
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- September 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814770351
- eISBN:
- 9780814762974
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814770351.003.0003
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology
Where chapter 1 showed multi-ethnic spaces where ethnic and religious difference were not critical to team formation, chapter 2 looks at Indo-Pak Basketball tournaments, especially in Chicago, that ...
More
Where chapter 1 showed multi-ethnic spaces where ethnic and religious difference were not critical to team formation, chapter 2 looks at Indo-Pak Basketball tournaments, especially in Chicago, that offer a way to disrupt the uniformity of South Asian American sporting masculinity through ethnicity, religion, and class. Though the young men affirm a sameness as South Asian Americans through shared racializations, they affirm difference through their religious, ethnic, and class backgrounds. In the process, they also set up difference from each other through particular athletic feats.Less
Where chapter 1 showed multi-ethnic spaces where ethnic and religious difference were not critical to team formation, chapter 2 looks at Indo-Pak Basketball tournaments, especially in Chicago, that offer a way to disrupt the uniformity of South Asian American sporting masculinity through ethnicity, religion, and class. Though the young men affirm a sameness as South Asian Americans through shared racializations, they affirm difference through their religious, ethnic, and class backgrounds. In the process, they also set up difference from each other through particular athletic feats.
Stanley I. Thangaraj
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- September 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814770351
- eISBN:
- 9780814762974
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814770351.003.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology
The introduction discusses the ways in which racialization is a gendered experience in theoretical terms. An examination of basketball cultures in South Asian America showcases the ways in which ...
More
The introduction discusses the ways in which racialization is a gendered experience in theoretical terms. An examination of basketball cultures in South Asian America showcases the ways in which racializations and the responses to racializations involve masculinity while connecting sport in a myriad of ways to the nation and diaspora. The introduction interrogates the conceptions of “manning up” and “browning out” while providing an outline of the book.Less
The introduction discusses the ways in which racialization is a gendered experience in theoretical terms. An examination of basketball cultures in South Asian America showcases the ways in which racializations and the responses to racializations involve masculinity while connecting sport in a myriad of ways to the nation and diaspora. The introduction interrogates the conceptions of “manning up” and “browning out” while providing an outline of the book.
Stanley I. Thangaraj
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- September 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814770351
- eISBN:
- 9780814762974
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814770351.003.0002
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology
This chapter explores the social context and cartography of Atlanta through South Asian American pick-up basketball spaces. By situating the mosques in the racial landscape of the bible-belt, ...
More
This chapter explores the social context and cartography of Atlanta through South Asian American pick-up basketball spaces. By situating the mosques in the racial landscape of the bible-belt, black-white U.S. South, the chapter explores how pick-up basketball presents an entrée into American-ness for young South Asian American men. Yet this entry into American-ness and ideas of meritocracy involves the exclusion of African American men and women from the sporting court. Furthermore, the chapter examines how South Asian American men perform an athletic masculinity through various basketball moves while signifying their class, race, and relation to immigration waves.Less
This chapter explores the social context and cartography of Atlanta through South Asian American pick-up basketball spaces. By situating the mosques in the racial landscape of the bible-belt, black-white U.S. South, the chapter explores how pick-up basketball presents an entrée into American-ness for young South Asian American men. Yet this entry into American-ness and ideas of meritocracy involves the exclusion of African American men and women from the sporting court. Furthermore, the chapter examines how South Asian American men perform an athletic masculinity through various basketball moves while signifying their class, race, and relation to immigration waves.
Stanley I. Thangaraj
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- September 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814770351
- eISBN:
- 9780814762974
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814770351.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology
South Asian American men are not usually depicted as ideal American men. They struggle against popular representations as either threatening terrorists or geeky, effeminate computer geniuses. To ...
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South Asian American men are not usually depicted as ideal American men. They struggle against popular representations as either threatening terrorists or geeky, effeminate computer geniuses. To combat such stereotypes, some use sports as a means of performing a distinctly American masculinity. Desi Hoop Dreams focuses on the South Asian–only basketball leagues common in major U.S. and Canadian cities to show that basketball for these South Asian American players is not simply a hobby, but a means to navigate and express their identities in 21st-century America. The participation of young men in basketball is one platform among many for performing South Asian American identity. South Asian–only leagues and tournaments become spaces in which to negotiate the relationships between masculinity, race, and nation. Faced with stereotypes that portray them as effeminate, players perform sporting feats on the court to represent themselves as athletic. And though they draw on black cultural styles, they carefully set themselves off from African American players, who are deemed “too aggressive.” Accordingly, the same categories of their own marginalization—masculinity, race, class, and sexuality—are those through which South Asian American men exclude women, queer masculinities, and working-class masculinities, along with other racialized masculinities, in their effort to lay claim to cultural citizenship. One of the first works on masculinity formation and sport participation in South Asian American communities, Desi Hoop Dreams focuses on an American popular sport to analyze the dilemma of belonging within South Asian America in particular and the U.S. in general.Less
South Asian American men are not usually depicted as ideal American men. They struggle against popular representations as either threatening terrorists or geeky, effeminate computer geniuses. To combat such stereotypes, some use sports as a means of performing a distinctly American masculinity. Desi Hoop Dreams focuses on the South Asian–only basketball leagues common in major U.S. and Canadian cities to show that basketball for these South Asian American players is not simply a hobby, but a means to navigate and express their identities in 21st-century America. The participation of young men in basketball is one platform among many for performing South Asian American identity. South Asian–only leagues and tournaments become spaces in which to negotiate the relationships between masculinity, race, and nation. Faced with stereotypes that portray them as effeminate, players perform sporting feats on the court to represent themselves as athletic. And though they draw on black cultural styles, they carefully set themselves off from African American players, who are deemed “too aggressive.” Accordingly, the same categories of their own marginalization—masculinity, race, class, and sexuality—are those through which South Asian American men exclude women, queer masculinities, and working-class masculinities, along with other racialized masculinities, in their effort to lay claim to cultural citizenship. One of the first works on masculinity formation and sport participation in South Asian American communities, Desi Hoop Dreams focuses on an American popular sport to analyze the dilemma of belonging within South Asian America in particular and the U.S. in general.
Vivek Bald, Miabi Chatterji, Sujani Reddy, and Manu Vimalassery (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814786437
- eISBN:
- 9780814786451
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814786437.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
This book collects the work of a generation of scholars who are enacting a shift in the orientation of the field of South Asian American studies. By focusing upon the lives, work, and activism of ...
More
This book collects the work of a generation of scholars who are enacting a shift in the orientation of the field of South Asian American studies. By focusing upon the lives, work, and activism of specific, often unacknowledged, migrant populations, the chapters present a more comprehensive vision of the South Asian presence in the United States. Tracking the changes in global power that have influenced the paths and experiences of migrants, from expatriate Indian maritime workers at the turn of the century, to Indian nurses during the Cold War, to post-9/11 detainees and deportees caught in the crossfire of the “War on Terror,” the chapters reveal how the South Asian diaspora has been shaped by the contours of U.S. imperialism. Driven by a shared sense of responsibility among the contributing scholars to alter the profile of South Asian migrants in the American public imagination, the book addresses the key issues that impact these migrants in the U.S., on the subcontinent, and in circuits of the transnational economy. The book provides tools with which to understand the contemporary political and economic conjuncture and the place of South Asian migrants within it.Less
This book collects the work of a generation of scholars who are enacting a shift in the orientation of the field of South Asian American studies. By focusing upon the lives, work, and activism of specific, often unacknowledged, migrant populations, the chapters present a more comprehensive vision of the South Asian presence in the United States. Tracking the changes in global power that have influenced the paths and experiences of migrants, from expatriate Indian maritime workers at the turn of the century, to Indian nurses during the Cold War, to post-9/11 detainees and deportees caught in the crossfire of the “War on Terror,” the chapters reveal how the South Asian diaspora has been shaped by the contours of U.S. imperialism. Driven by a shared sense of responsibility among the contributing scholars to alter the profile of South Asian migrants in the American public imagination, the book addresses the key issues that impact these migrants in the U.S., on the subcontinent, and in circuits of the transnational economy. The book provides tools with which to understand the contemporary political and economic conjuncture and the place of South Asian migrants within it.
