Negotiating Mobility: South Asian Women and Higher Education

Abstract

Using qualitative and quantitative data, this article explains how South Asian women’s attendance at university in Britain went from being exceptional in the 1970s to routine in the present century. Focusing upon the reflexivity of young South Asian women around issues of education, subject choice, marriage and careers in relation to their parents and their communities offers a better understanding than currently dominant social capital explanations of South Asian educational success. We show that conceptualizing reflexivity in a variety of forms following Archer better accounts for the different educational trajectories at the intersection of relations of ethnicity, class, gender and religion. The educational and career outcomes and transformations entail complex forms of resistance, negotiation and compromise across intersecting identities. These developments are transforming class and gender relations within South Asian ethnicities.