"How is it that you know my name?" she asked. "Knowing names is my art. To weave the magic of a thing, one must find its true name out. In my land, we keep our true names hidden all our lives long, from all but those whom we trust utterly; for there is great power and great peril, in a name." – Ursula Le Guin, The Tombs of Atuan
I never seriously encountered the term South Asian until I began visiting the US. There, I heard it often, evoking immigration, basement bhangra, bindis and unorganised labour. I saw it on Internet listservs from groups that tracked the mentions of Southasia and Southasians in the US mediascape with dogged numerical lenses. I heard it from 'intelligent but beautiful' brown girls with straight hair and black pants, as they spoke of identity, gender, art. I noticed it in the names of the university departments that sponsored my films' screenings. Soon I came to understand the joke that was going around: How do you know you're Southasian? When someone does research on you! I was ambivalent about the term.
In my own work as a documentary filmmaker, I have always been resolutely local. This is not a coincidence of domicile, but rather a conscious decision, allowing me to define the political against differences, blurring narratives of pan-national, masculinist, progressive film. So, as a habitual discontent, I immediately looked on this expansive term warily, with that niggling feeling that progressive elites who speak of inclusion are often the most benignly exclusionist of all, unable to acknowledge the margin within the margins. I could see the usefulness of the term to a diasporic community – a platform that could bring together people of the region, with shared immigrant and racial experiences, while offering greater political leverage. But I could also see other things. For instance that, reflecting regional hegemonies, Southasia and India were often interchangeable, and not just for non-Southasian onlookers; that Southasian organisations had primarily Indian memberships and thematic pursuits; that while many organisations had progressive or leftist agendas, the more prominent activists and spokespersons were usually male and middle class, unless the organisation focused specifically on women's issues.
Some of us have remained invisible in the new name, devoured by the multicultural zeal. The ideal of multiculturalism assumes that everyone placed in these categories has equal space and voice within and between them…We are trying to create a single space while ignoring the politics of positioning and our fluid positions within a complicated nexus of gender, class, race, religious, cultural, sexual and national positioning. And who is making this new box for me? … Who does it make visible and who does it negate?