Focusing just on IAs in the U.S., I'd say there is yet another phenomenon, but this time focused on the Hindu community. While the children of Bengali, Tamil, Gujarati immigrants readily join South Asian clubs, the regional Hindu practices do not dissolve. So you will see Bengali kids at a bhangra party, but they will still go to Durga Puja in the autumn. In cases where marriage takes place across linguistic/regional lines, there seems to be an expectation that the new couple will have to attend both traditional ceremonies. For instance, Diwali was no big deal among the Bengalis. In high school, when a teacher wished me a Happy Diwali, I was caught off guard. But, in one Bengali husband - Gujarati wife couple I know, he now holds Diwali celebrations in his home, while they also drive to his parents' home for Durga Puja. 
 
Due to the more heteogenous nature of Indian immigration into the U.S., I do not see the rise of one clear "Indian" identity for at least another generation. As for the place of Indian Muslims, region place a factor again. I find Hindu Bengalis and Muslim Bengalis interact with each other to a greater degree than Hindus and Muslims from North India.  
 
South Indian Muslims (in Indian and the U.S.) feel more assured in their Indian background, possibly due to the slim chance of their being mistaken for a Pakistani or Arab. South Indian Muslims, while being quite conservative in some aspects, also seem to have a vibrant reform wing, headed largely by Muslim women. I guess it's the no-nonsense reputation that South Indians have showing itsself.

The states in India with the fewest children per family are also those states which have higher levels of female literacy. This is even without western-style sex education. Alas, once again, India's Hindi heartland lags far behind other regions in female literacy.

Most of the Indians you've come across will come from the higher IQ group, which are often higher caste as well. Nehru, himself a Brahmin from Kashmir, put more emphasis on graduate education for fellow upper-casters like himself, rather than focus on basic education, which would have substantially benefited the lower caste groups. he held the widely held beliefe that India would progress much more rapidly with such people at the helm. Of course, that turned out to be one of Nehru's many mistakes.

On the other hand, if India were physically situated where Mexico is - you'd probably see plenty of lower caste gardeners, maids, and busboys.

There is some correlation between caste and complexion, but mostly among Northern Indians. In the South, you can come across a dark complexioned Brahmin who can do complex equations on the back of an envelope. That's the stereotype, anyway.

Rush's comment is clearly aimed at the media, and not at Donovan McNabb. But how about his central thesis - that the kid glove treatment is due to McNabb being black? Not much evidence for it - McNabb led his team to two consecutive conference finals. His season so far this year has not lived up to that level of play, but when compared to his overall career, this may very well be a blip. So, it might be cause the sportswriters feel he is just in a rut, or teams have adjusted to his style of play. Compare this to the thrashing that Kordell Stewart is receiving in the Chicago media. The woeful 0-3 Bears are being shown absolutely no mercy by either the Tribune or the Sun-Times. So in this particular case, it does not seem that the NFL "go soft on the brothers" policy is working.

It's one of the less-examined areas of journalism, but sportwriters are notorious for letting their personal biases seep into their reporting. While Mickey Mantle's problems with drinking were well known in the press box, it never made the press, cause Mantle knew how to woo the press. Same with Michael Jordan - his fondness for high stakes gambling and women other than his wife were know, ut because all the writers simply liked him, they did not want to print it. Charles Barkley, who held sports writers in contempt, got no such kid-glove treatment. Maybe this whole thing could have been avoided if McNabb bought Rush a beer.

I share Frederik's opinion - the women of Friends, Buffy the Vampire Slayer - nothing remotely sensual about these women. The amount of makeup they have to cake onto Lisa Kudrow (the 40 year old Friend) is just too much. I'm starting to think even their looks are subject to a test marketing group.

Fukuyama is often unfairly characterized as arguring that with the end of the Cold War, everything was going to be hunky dory. He never stated that. He argued that history was a process by which different forms of political organization were tried - monarchy, oligarchy, direct democracy, military rule - but each was to be measured by their ability to survive. Those governments that had elements of representative democracy and market economics were the ones that provided better standard of livings and ensured individual freedoms.

But, he also forsaw conflicts between those nations that are "post-history" like the US, Western Europe, and Japan, and those that were still stuck in history, such as most of the Muslim world. So, 9/11 was not a refutation of Fukuyama, but an example of such conflict.

Saw her give an interview on Charlie Rose just after she won the Pulitzer. TV Studio lighting is far less forgiving than in a photo studio. But her writing is pretty good. I'm still waiting for the Bengali equivalent of a David Mamet to come along - dropping all the beautiful imagery and substituting loads of profanity and staccato sentence structures.

It seems that "People of the Book" have trouble with any faith or belief system that does not spell out in Big Bold Letters what is right and wrong. It always struck me as odd, that if God is so awesomely powerful, why does he have to send his message through flesh and blood human beings? Certainly He would have known that such men (interestingly, no women) would be viewed with suspicion. Unless, such men were self-absorbed to a degree that we normally associate with politicians. At least when the Hindu mystic Ramakrishna claimed to see the goddess Kali in a vision, he did not out to conquer his neighbors, unlike a certain Arabic fellow, who, having been exposed to a little too much desert sun, felt that God commanded him to spread his message far and wide, by force if necessary, and along the way marry a little girl, and marry his son’s wife.

The absurdity of “modern day” Islam is that while less than a fifth of the world’s Muslims are Arabic, all prayers are conducted in Arabic, and translating the Koran into native languages is discourages. Naipaul described how Pakistanis believe they are Arabic, since it is more comfortable to believe that one’s ancestors came in with the conquering army, than the more likely case – a low caste Hindu who converted, the descendant of a woman who was forced into a Muslim marriage, or a descendant of a convert or die Muslim. This dlusion carries over into choice of food, as many Pakistanis claim that their favorite fruit are dates, even though dates generally do not grow in that climate. But apparently, mangos are too associated with the kafirs of India.

Modern Christianity has a host of different problems. But chief among them would have to be abandoning Christ’s offering of God’s love. Christians seem particularly skilled at telling me all the ways I am going to hell – love almost never crosses their lips. Nietcze was right when he claimed that the last Christian died on the cross.

As for the Hindutva crowd, their own unique idiocy comes through in that they are adopting the worst aspects of what they charge against Islam – forcing their set of beliefs onto others. It abandons the traditional Hindu approach – extensive meditation upon God, and instead offers ready-made solutions, almost all of which involve kicking Muslims out.

While India's traditional rejection of product patents in favor of process patents is well established, this will soon fade. India will begin recognizing Western-style product patents in 2005, since it signed the TRIPs agreement. Partly this was out of self-interest. Large Indian pharmaceutical firms such as Dr. Reddy's and Cipla want to move up the value chain and develop new drugs of their own.

Secondly, such product patents help promote drug research into diseases that mostly affect poorer countries. It would not be economical for Abbott or Pfizer to use American researchers to develop a drug for use in the subcontinent or Africa, as the could never price in a way to recoup their investment and be affordable to those populations. However, using cheaper Indian talent would make such pricing more feasible, although too many drugs still face price controls.

While India’s continued frustrations in getting a grip on caste discrimination are well documented, the most violent demonstration of genocide in South Asia occurred in neighboring Pakistan. Somewhere between 1-3 million Bengalis were killed by the Punjabi dominated Pakistani army (so much for the notion of the Muslim ummah) during Bangladesh’s war of independence. Another 10 million refugees spilled across the border into West Bengal. Among the common pejoratives hurled against Bengalis was that they were a bunch of skinny, dark-skinned, fish eaters, whereas the Punjabis were the subcontinent’s premier martial people. That such Punjabis were overwhelmingly Sikh seems to have been forgotten by the Pakistanis. The Pakistani army set up special rape camps, where Bengali girls who had not even reached puberty were not spared.

Considering that all this took place in the span of less than one year, the Pakistani army proved to be one of the most efficient civilian killing machines of the late 20th century. But this is probably the most overlooked genocide, since it was committed by one set of brown people against another. Plus, Pakistan was an ally of the US at the time.

Razib,

Yes, Bengali Hindus suffered disproportinately, but when Pakistani tanks rolled into Dhaka, the tank treads drew no such distinction. And there was plenty of an uproar a number of years ago when General Musharaff said that Bangladesh should just forget about the unpleasant business of 1971.

I think much of the attempt to have Indians align themselves with the political agenda of black leftists is that it is the only way to get tenure at most universities. How many aspiring professors are going to be offered a post when the put forth the idea that Indians have assimilated well? But, I do sometimes get the impression that Pakistanis and Bangladeshis in the US are repeating the pattern of their UK cousins, and starting to self- segregate themselves.

And, if we want to address the issue of interracial violence, I think a quick poll would show that if an Indian had been mugged or murdered, the assailant was generally black or Hispanic. The only prominent case I can remember where a white guy killed an Indian couple was about 12 years ago in Westchester County, NY. While strung out on drugs and booze, the son of a Chase Bank VP broke into the home of an Indian physician couple, and repeatedly stabbed the two. When the police arrived, they said it liked like a butchershop inside. Eleven members of the jury were convinced of the man’s guilt, but because one woman could not believe that a young man from such a good family could do such a thing, he was not convicted.

I will say this though – if you disregard the criminal element, and focus solely on the average black person, I personally have experienced less fake flattery from them than from whites. If anything, I’ve found that blacks will confide in me issues and feelings they are often uncomfortable expressing to other black people, and certainly not to whites.

In my opinion, prejudice against South Asians is not always demonstrated by what is done, but oftentimes by what is not done. Our complaints that affirmative action is unfair to us are unheard, news stories about how “oppressive” our cultures are towards women go unchallenged (take a bet which group has a higher percentage of college-educated women, white families or Indian American?), and that we are lumped in for special scrutiny with Arabs

Marinara,

I guess I should clarify - Indian social scientists with hopes for tenure would probably be more likely to parrot the old leftist ideas of the nature of race relations in the U.S. In other disciplines - business, engineering, etc. - such viewpoints will probably not be a factor. In my MBA program at George Washington University, my financial accounting, economics, and information systems management professors were all Indians, and my marketing professor was married to an Indian who also taught marketing at GW. And a quick flipping through of an issue of Harvard Business Review will usually have at least one article written or co-written by an Indian.

I share your disappointment at the SC decision, but I think schools will be so gunshy of a lawsuit, that more schoole wills go the route of Texas and California.

When I lived in DC, the Ethiopian and Somali drivers would often not pick up young black men. Black women - fine, black guys in suits - fine, old black people - fine. But a guy dressed like a hoodie - wait for the bus.

The relationship between the coach and Jasminder did not bother me. However, I was a bit unnerved to learn that parminder Nagra, the actress playing Jasminder, is 27 years old, while her character was 10 years younger. Why is it that so many filmmakers want to find adults to play teenagers? My thought was that it is more acceptable for male viewers to be drawn towards the actress, without being thought of as a dirty old man.

As for the portrayal of brown dudes in the movie, you overlook two men. One the father, a proud Sikh, who yet does have a sense of humor and is willing to express his frustration with his shrill wife. The other, the young man who was engaged to Jess's older sister, who overruled his mother's objections in marrying a girl from a family with a 'shameful' girl. Incidentally, Archie Punjabi, who played the older sister, played the Bangladeshi wife Alsana in the recent PBS adaptation of Zadie Smith's "White Teeth"

Part of the reason that North Indians tend to abort their girls more than South Indians may be due to the history of invasion the North experienced. From the Greeks to the Afghans, the northern portion of the subcontinent experienced wave after wave of invasion. To attempt to repel such invasions, you need men to fight. Plus, with the notion of "honor" that seems particularly acute among Punjabis, a woman presents a tempting target for invading armies. During Partition, many Sikh women were murdered by their own families, lest they be 'dishonored' by Muslim mobs.

In the South, you did not see this one invasion after the next, so social systems could be geared towards growth, and well educated women clearly contribute to a regions growth. While North Indians tend to dominate the cultural and political landscape, the main economic growth areas are in the South. And South Indians tend to be disproportionately represented among IIT grads. India's president, Abdul Kalam, is himself a Tamil Muslim.

How about approaching the subject from the old sex and violence angle? The U.S. has been involved in a number of wars in Asia, from Japan, to Korea, and Vietnam. Consequently, some Asian immigrants may have decidely mixed feelings towards a country that in some respects fought the Cold War in their backyard. (The biggest misconception about the Cold War is that it was peaceful) Plus, the heavy American troop presence in a number of Asian nations can be a sore spot. While such troops provide a degree of stability, they are sometimes viewed by the locals as the army of a colonizer. You can picture one of those Korean student protesters, wondering alound why a prosperous country like their's needs 30,000 American troops on their soil, that are sometimes above the law.

Then there is sex. Where there are troops, there are brothels. So, again, some Asians may view Americans as the corrupters of Asian women. And then when they settle in the states, they see a disproportionate amount of Asian women marrying Americans.

From the American viewpoint, the experience that some American soldiers experienced in various Asian conflicts may color their attitude towards Asians in general. I've always sensed a degree of acceptance towards Filipinos by Americans that was not often extended to Chinese, Koreans, etc. And it has to be more than that American sailors referring to Filipina bargirls as LBFMs.

On the other hand, there has historically been little American interest in South Asia, outside of academia and the CIA paling around with their Pakistani ISI buddies during the 80s. So, Americans cannot really point to their own experience, or that of their parents, when it comes to Indians. There is no 'template' if you will, that could shape interactions between Americans and Indians. With little negative history between the two populations, integration may be easier.

Comments?

Brown guy here.

The comparison I like to use is a free market vs heavy regulation. In America, the dating marketplace is fairly free of constraints. This benefits those men and women that have the qualities most sought after. Chris Rock had a great routine about it, which went something like, "Women say there aren't enough men. That's wrong. There are plenty of men out there, but you women all want to f*** the same guys. They all want the ambitious go-getter. But guess what? That ambitious go-getter is often going from one woman to the next. Here's a rule of thumb - if a man has two cars, and no wife, he's f****** four women. Meanwhile, most men are sitting around, asking themselves, 'When the hell am I going to get laid?'"

This soulmate business is nonsense. It raises expectations about romance, and face it, keeping up the level of romantic heat that often comes with early courtship is not feasible.

My brother, raised in the states, married a Bengali raised in India. My parents were so relieved at having "preserved" our culture, they forgot to look at her character. While she treats my brother very well, she will have almost nothing to do with the rest of us. She's lived in the states for almost six years, and has spent less than two months with us. As a result, my parents have specifically requested that I not get married to a girl from India.

My dad did try to meet with a family in England in finding me a wife, but found it went nowhere. The girl's family asked him to tell them a bit about me, and he was at a loss. Since he never got to know me beyond report cards, he realized he could not give the girl's family any idea of what I was like as a man.

Andrew Sullivan had a good piece on America's elevation of romantic love. Although written two years ago, many of the observations still bear relevance.

http://www.andrewsullivan.com/culture.php?artnum=20010211

R,

That is pretty weird that we both cited Sullivan at the same time. But it really is a solid piece of writing.

As for skin tone, maybe it's cause I'm already fairly light skinned, but I generally am attracted to Indian girls that have a darker complexion than me. If an Indian girls is too light, she looks sickly. Back in college, I knew a Goanese girl who was simply stunning, with the complexion of chocolate, and the body of an aerobics instructor. Needless to say, she was way out of my league, and it seemed she exclusively dated white guys anyway. In India, many Indian families would have found her too dark, but in the states, she satisfied the market demand for in-shaped, bronze colored women.

As for arranged marriage, it is true that parents can be even more superficial than young people. My mother rejected a potential bride for my brother because her mom was a nurse. If you can guess that your parents have bad judgment, then you probably have a stronger objection to arranged marriage.

While some biracial women like Halle Berry and Vanessa Williams are often cited as attractive black women, being biracial doesn't automatically translate into attractiveness. Mariah Carey does nothing for me, but I would be very tempted to sell my soul for a chance to date SI Swimsuit model, Roshumba Williams.

One interesting trend to watch for is the effect of the education gap between black men and women. The rate of black men enrolling in college already lags behind black women, and by the time you look at graduate and professional schools, that gap almost becomes a chasm. Since women generally do not date or marry below their education level, well-educated black women will find themselves alone if they wait for an equally well educated black man. At this upper end, I'm guessing we'll see an increasing number of black women taking on equally well-educated, non-black partners. But this still leaves an even larger number of less educated black women with poor options.