Doctoral Dissertation Research: Understanding (Indian) Techno-mirgration: Experiences and Structural Conditions

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This dissertation research, supported by the Science, Technology & Society program at NSF and the MPS directorate under the Math/Physical Sciences & Society Dear Colleague Letter initiative, focuses on technomigration. Technomigration is the movement of a group of technologically educated, highly skilled people; this project looks at technomigration between India and the United States. It will document and analyze the experiences and perceptions of technomigrants and the structural conditions that shape the mobility, and the ability to be highly mobile, for Indian technomigrants. The goals of this study are to understand: (a) global flows of technoscientific labor and how it is valued across diverse physical and social spaces, and (b) the ways in which Indian technomigrants understand and value their own mobility. Ethnographic engagement with Indian technomigrants (in the U.S. and in India) will be used to trace their educational and career trajectories, and to understand the interplay between the experiential and structural dimensions of technomigration. Participant observation at various seminars and conferences, and policy analysis of documents will support the ethnographic analysis. This study will draw on and contribute to literatures in the fields of Science and Technology Studies and Cultural Anthropology. It will add to the empirical record on Indian technomigration, analyze the role of technoscience as an enabler of mobility and diaspora-formation, and link theories of value to contemporary theories of globalization. The analysis resulting from this study can potentially inform national and global immigration policies with respect to high-tech labor. A focus on the subjective experiences of Indian immigrants will also give voice to their concerns.