We tend to always talk about how South Asian young adults are succeeding, but is that always the case? Data shows that over 1 in 10 Nepali and Bhutanese youth ages 16 to 24 are neither working or in school.
And while the percentage of disconnected youth for our different nationalities has declined between 2000 and 2019, for Nepali youth, they have actually increased between 2010-2019. There was not a large enough population size to determine the percentage of Bhutanese disconnected youth in earlier years.
What is interesting about these stats, and a common trend we have been seeing throughout our discussions, is that immigrants tend to have higher percentages of disconnected youth, compared to their US-born counter parts.
Institutional and systemic barriers contribute to disparities in educational attainment for immigrants, which also varies by immigration status. Disparities in educational attainment also vary by nationality, as different immigrant communities face unique sets of institutional and systemic challenges like language access.
A basic google search did not identify many social services to address the needs of these communities. We will delve into this issue in future blog posts.
This week, we are sharing data on an often difficult point of discussion within the South Asian community – caste. There have been several articles that have come out over the years about caste discrimination in the United States. These include discrimination in universities,workplaces, religious institutions, and more.
In 2018, Equality Labs shared a report which identified key points in a survey of 1,500 South Asians to a 47 question survey on Caste. The web-based, self-reported, self-administered questionnaire was directed at those in the diaspora who identified as having subcontinental heritage from Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, the Maldives, Trinidad/Tobago, Guyana, Fiji, Tanzania, and Kenya. It was open to people of different religions, political, tribal, and caste affiliations.
The survey found that many South Asians who identified as being from the “lower” Castes – especially Dalits, Adivasis, and Shudras tend to “hide their Caste” and tend to worry about being “outed.” The report shares that several respondents expressed significant amounts of psychological turmoil they sustained around the secrecy of their Caste. Being outed meant that they and their families could be rejected from South Asian cultural and religious spaces, lose professional and social networks, and even face bullying, abuse, and violence.
One of the ways this discrimination occurs is in schools. The survey found that 40% of Dalit students reported facing discrimination in educational institutions in the US compared to only 3% of respondents who were from “upper” castes.
Many respondents reported discrimination from their fellow South Asian students. In universities, “lower” Caste students may be asked to move to other living quarters, forbidden from cooking non-vegetarian food, or socially excluded from South Asian student groups and professional networking circles.
People reported facing caste discrimination in the workplace, in local businesses, in places of religious worship. Caste discrimination also may have also influenced whether they rejected a partner or were rejected by one.
Some key findings from the study were:
Their key recommendations for South Asian organizations coming out of the study were to ensure that the organization vision and/or mission statements mentioned Caste explicitly so that every progressive South Asian American community remains committed to the idea that we must fight both white supremacy and Caste apartheid in our journey towards equity for all of our communities.
South Asian American immigrant networks must also work to support Caste, religious, and geographic diversity, especially the communities from Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, Ravidassia, and Sikh backgrounds. They encourage South Asian American organizations to organize cultural events that celebrate this diversity in communities, and not to narrow our experiences to only marking Hindu festivals as our marker of cultural solidarity.
Given this, are there ways that we can do a better job of facilitating conversations around caste amongst our own families? Are there ways that we can make those of “lower” castes feel more comfortable sharing their experiences? Can we choose to be more inclusive and appreciate the diverse experiences of our fellow South Asians? We would love to know what your thoughts are on this topic.
The model minority myth has followed many of us around our entire lives and we often don’t question it’s truthfulness. But, by not doing so, we are missing out on important yet difficult conversations about privilege in our own communities. This is particularly apparent when it comes to educational attainment.
You will notice from the chart above, that educational attainment varies significantly across the South Asian community. While 81.9 percent of Indians ages 25-64 have a BA or higher in the United States, this success is a sharp contrast to the Bhutanese community, where only 6.9 percent of the population has gotten at least a BA degree.
The Bhutanese population is made up of mostly refugees that have arrived here over the past decade and made their home in America. According to the White House, 85,000 Bhutanese refugees have resettled in the United States, with the largest populations residing in Texas, New York, Indiana, North Carolina, and Georgia.
We can also see that while more South Asians have achieved a BA or higher between 2000 and 2019, this hasn’t been true for ever group within the community. The percentage of people getting a BA or higher actually decreased for those in the Nepali community from 57.5 percent in 2010 to 46.5 percent in 2019. It is unclear from the few research articles we found on Nepali immigrants why the percentage of people with a BA or higher declined – but this could definitely be an area of further research.
When we broke down the percentage of people receiving a BA or higher by nativity (whether residents were US-born or immigrants), we found that Immigrants tended to also have lower percentage with a BA or higher across all the South Asian groups where it was possible to compare.
This is important because education is an important metric to evaluate economic mobility for the Desi community. South Asian immigrants have varied educational backgrounds and expanding avenues for our immigrant communities to utilize their skills and contribute matters. Providing pathways for more immigrants in the United States to access education is also important in improving the overall health and economic wellbeing of everyone in our society.
There have been groups that have popped up across the United States which are making an effort to integrate those in the Bhutanese refugee community such as the Bhutanese Community of Central Ohio and Bhutanese Community Association of Pittsburg (BCAP). These organizations provide social assistance to refugees and help them begin their new life in the US. But more can be done to support these groups and others who are helping to support those who are struggling amongst us.
