Wajihah Hamid
National University of Singapore, Singapore
Keywords: Tamil migrant workers, Singapore, Little India, transnational home, policing, governmentality
DOI: 10.5509/20158815
Low-wage Tamil migrant workers have long been contributing to Singapore. Despite labouring for three decades and being connected to the existing Tamil diasporic community in Singapore, they have been left out in both state rhetoric and society, often due to claims of transience. Conversely, a fatal traffic accident in the locality of Singapore’s Little India in December 2013 involving a Tamil migrant worker that morphed into a ‘riot’ has again brought these men and their presence within the vicinity of Little India to the fore. This paper uses the concept of “transnational home” as a lens to study their everyday experience in Singapore’s Little India. The homely feelings experienced by the migrant workers highlight their feelings of homesickness vis-à-vis the need for a sense of belonging felt amongst transnational male migrant workers. On the other hand, practices that make the space unhomely for them not only illustrate their social position but will also contribute to the study of the governmentality of migration and control of migrant bodies. This paper is based on a wider ethnographic study of a group of Tamil migrant workers from the south Indian state of Tamil Nadu who were working in Singapore in 2012.
低薪的泰米尔劳工长期以来为新加坡经济做出着贡献。尽管在新加坡出卖劳力已经逾三十年，并且与原有的旅居新加坡的泰米尔海外社区建立了联系，泰米尔劳工却通常以短期居住为由被排除在国家的宏大叙事和社会之外。然而，２０１２年十二月新加坡＂小印度＂地界发生的一桩涉及一名泰米尔移民劳工的致命车祸演变为一场＂暴乱＂，却将这些劳工和他们在＂小印度＂附近的存在再度暴露于公众眼前。本论文使用“跨国之家”的概念，作为研究他们在新加坡“小印度”日常经历的一个透镜。外籍劳工体验到的“如家”的感受展示了与男性跨国劳工对一种归属感觉的需要的感受相关的思乡之情。另一方面，那些令此空间对这些劳工“毫无如家之感”的做法不仅揭示出他们的社会地位，也会为研究劳工治理术以及对海外劳工群体的控制等方面的课题作出贡献。本论文的基础是一项对２０１２年在新加坡工作的一群泰米尔外劳的更广泛的民族志研究。 Translated from English by Li Guo
泰米尔劳工在新加坡 “小印度” :对 “如家般” 和 “全无如家之感” 的家的感受
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