Stanford University Press Paperback English
Becoming Boundless
Indian Transnational Entrepreneurs in the Global Economy
By Manashi Ray
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How do Indian men and women migrant entrepreneurs play a part in repositioning India as a pivotal actor in the twenty-first century's multipolar world order? In Becoming Boundless, Manashi Ray draws on ethnographic and archival research to uncover how they create and participate in transnational networks, and how these networks in turn drive the growth of global capitalism. Ray pays particular attention to the expansive global networks of transnational Indian entrepreneurs between the United States and India and across several other nations. Covering a 10-year period in India's post-reform era, Ray deftly highlights complex connections between the social and spatial mobility of this diverse, bi-cultural population, and uniquely theorizes the intersection of class, caste, and gender. She questions whether migration reinforces dominant forms of social inequality or transforms it through the redistribution of valued goods and life chances, especially for women in male-dominated sectors. The book therefore recasts contemporary migration as a crucial part of the emergence of transnational economic spaces, and analyzes the ways that these spaces are fragmented and hierarchical.
How do Indian men and women migrant entrepreneurs play a part in repositioning India as a pivotal actor in the twenty-first century's multipolar world order? In Becoming Boundless, Manashi Ray draws on ethnographic and archival research to uncover how they create and participate in transnational networks, and how these networks in turn drive the growth of global capitalism. Ray pays particular attention to the expansive global networks of transnational Indian entrepreneurs between the United States and India and across several other nations. Covering a 10-year period in India's post-reform era, Ray deftly highlights complex connections between the social and spatial mobility of this diverse, bi-cultural population, and uniquely theorizes the intersection of class, caste, and gender. She questions whether migration reinforces dominant forms of social inequality or transforms it through the redistribution of valued goods and life chances, especially for women in male-dominated sectors. The book therefore recasts contemporary migration as a crucial part of the emergence of transnational economic spaces, and analyzes the ways that these spaces are fragmented and hierarchical.