Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: The Sikh Diaspora in Australia: Migration, Militancy and the Imagining of Home

匹兹堡大学博士生Rory G. McCarthy，在Joseph S.奥尔特将研究记忆和怀旧在具体化生活在一个地方但声称起源于另一个地方的人群之间的联系中的作用。 特别令人感兴趣的是，过去的民族政治斗争如何影响当前对祖先家园的概念，以及这些家园概念如何反过来影响文化和宗教身份的概念。 这项研究将在澳大利亚新南威尔士州Woolgoolga的散居锡克教徒中进行。 研究者将通过参与观察、民族志访谈和当地媒体关于锡克教社区的话语分析来收集定性数据。他还将收集家庭叙事，或家庭移民的历史，因为他们是由家庭自己理解，探索政治言论和暴力的历史之间的关系，以及围绕着散居人口的家园思想的话语领域。 将关注印度和澳大利亚的社会，文化和政治力量，这些力量有助于塑造这种新兴的散居身份。 档案材料将被咨询，以记录锡克教徒迁移到该地区的历史。通过关注政治言论，暴力和对文化家园的怀旧情绪的汇合，这项研究将有助于了解民族政治斗争如何继续影响散居人口的身份和活动。资助这项研究也支持社会科学家的教育。

University of Pittsburgh doctoral student Rory G. McCarthy, with guidance from Dr. Joseph S. Alter, will undertake research on the role of memory and nostalgia in concretizing connections between groups of people living in one place, but claiming origination in another. Of particular interest will be how ethno-national political struggles of the past affect current conceptions of ancestral homelands, and how those conceptions of homeland in turn affect notions of cultural and religious identity. The research will be conducted among diasporic Sikhs in Woolgoolga, New South Wales, Australia. The researcher will collect qualitative data through participant observation, ethnographic interviews, and discourse analysis of local media about the Sikh community. He also will gather family narratives, or histories of family migration as they are understood by the families themselves, to explore the relationship between political rhetoric and a history of violence, and the discursive field surrounding ideas of homeland for diasporic populations. Attention will be paid to the social, cultural and political forces in India and Australia that have contributed to shaping this emerging diasporic identity. Archival materials will be consulted to document the history of Sikh migration to the area.By focusing on the confluence of political rhetoric, violence, and nostalgia for a cultural homeland, this research will contribute to understanding how ethno-national political struggles continue to affect the identities and activities of diasporic populations. Funding this research also supports the education of a social scientist.