Migration, Language, Identity: The Journey of Meixian Hakkas from Calcutta to Vienna
Ralf Vollmann and Tek Wooi Soon
Abstract
The Hakkas who migrated from Meizhou to Calcutta established successful businesses, and, between the 1970s and the 1990s, moved on to settle in Vienna (and Toronto). Practicing a closed-group life both in Vienna and across continents, the Hakkas preserved their language and culture while adapting both to India and Austria in various ways.
In a series of ethnographic meetings with Vienna-based Hakkas, questions of identity and the preservation of a minority culture are raised. In dependence to age, the consultants have very different personal identities embedded behind a shared social identity of being ‘Indian Hakkas’. This shared social identity is, however, mostly borne out of practical considerations of mutual support and certain cultural practices. As migrants, they are able to profit from close friendship and loyalty between and among group members, sharing the same professions, marrying inside the group, and more so, speaking their own language. Questions of identity are mostly relevant for the younger generation, which must contend with a confusingly layered familial identity.
Keywords: Migration, identity, language and migration, Calcutta Hakkas, Austrian Hakkas, linguistic anthropology