








st frontier province and Karachi, Pakistan; Haryana, Delhi, and Gangaaagar district of Rajasthan, India
Bengali	38,101	Bangladesh, West Bengal, Tripura, and Assam, Ma
Marathi	14,755	M^rsshtra and eight adjohrieg districts In three older states of India
Source: U.S, Censut Bureau
185
6. ASIAN AMERICANS
the community, says Kothari. Metropolitan Life was a major sponsor of the local Navaratri, a religious festival that attracted some 100,000 participants from around New Jersey, New York, and even further afield.  It didn t take a lot. One of the chief executives of the company attended the festival, and the company took out a series of ads in the souvenir program. Now we feel that we should reward the company for taking an interest in us. 
Indians do not have a  throw-away  mentality, says Jain. They expect value for their money and buy things with an eye to quality and durability.  Some West-
Asian Indians expect value for their money. They shop for quality and durability.
Well-Schooled in Bombay
Asian-Indian Americans are better educated than i average American.
(perceot dMribatiM of total aad Aaiaa-ladiaii population aged 25 and okh educational attakHneat, 1090)
lees ttan Ngh school soon codege, associate s bachelot's advanced Ugh school gradoate no degree degree degree	degree
.Sourre: U.S. i
I i
erners may think it strange to see a doctor or engineer standing in line at a department store to get a broken appliance repaired. They may think,  Wouldn t it be easier just to buy a new one?  But that is not the Indian way,  says Jain.
Seeking value goes beyond durable goods. Many Asian Indians run up large long-distance telephone bills talking to extended family in India, so they actively price-shop among both major and smaller long-distance companies. These telecommunications companies are perhaps the most active in marketing directly to Asian Indians, with Indian-theme advertisements, Indian-language services, and highly competitive rates.
ASSIMILATING EASILY
The children of Asian-Indian immigrants set the tone for many purchases made outside the local Indian communities, especially for clothing and food. Second generation and  generation one-and-a-halfers,  as Bryn Mawr College assistant dean Sonya Mehta describes Indians who came to the U.S. when they were young, may feel more American than Indian.
Asian-Indian children, like most second-generation Americans, are straddling two cultures. While they are as American
ized as their schoolmates, they are strongly influenced by their parents tradition and religion. They may listen to American pop music and watch American movies, but they are also comfortable with the popular music and movies of India. They also tend to follow the ways of their elders when it comes to such traditions as marriage and child-rearing.
This dual existence has found an outlet in a flourishing subculture of Indo-American magazines like Masala, Onward, and Hum. The magazines feature articles on drug use and prostitution among young Asian-Indian Americans, but they also review Indian art and dance exhibitions. Advertisers include long-distance telephone companies, airlines, Indian restaurants, and matchmaking/dating services.
Children in Asian-Indian American households carry a lot of weight when it comes to non-Indian food purchases.  My kids want American food. They don t like Indian food,  says Pradip Kothari s wife Nandini.  And they want specific things  McDonald s, Coke, and things like that.  SUNY Buffalo s Arun Jain points out that many Indian women, especially those who may not be particularly English-literate or educated in Western traditions, are not
familiar with many product typical supermarket. He s food manufacturers and n enhance sales to this grou hints on how to adapt prodi recipes and the Indian pa. cooking courses on cable T\ ethnic newspapers.
While children may influei ping choices, parents e thers are the primary dec for most major purchases, together, but the husband n power over purchases, acco This is especially true foi wealthy shoppers. Even w and wife* are both professic unusual for the man to domi decisions.
The children of older Indis are now beginning to mai families of their own. Many | are willing to spend a larj money on parties, gifts, hon even down payments for h dominiums. At the same t these parents are about to another reason for parties a goods and services associate banquet halls, caterers, I
186
36. Asian-Indian Americans
>ther service providers. Asian Indians Retimes seek such services from other Indians who understand their culture, but wt always.  Indians do not necessarily vantto deal with other Indians,  says Jain.  What they want is credibility, re-.pect, and good service. Indians will patronize stores with good service. 
Jain sees a burgeoning opportunity for the travel and tourism industries as this older generation reaches its retirement years.  Most people go to India to see their families, but as they age, there is less reason to travel, since there are fewer people left to visit in the old country. This is the time for Indian empty nesters to see the United States,  Jain says. And while most non-Indians may assume that the only foreign trips Indians make are back to their home country, Nandini Kothari points out that her family does so only once every three or four years.  We go to see our families, but we don t go too often. It s usually too hot, the kids don t enjoy it, and there are so many family obligations that we don t get much of a chance to rest. We prefer to go to the Caribbean for our vacations. 
REACHING ASIAN INDIANS
Although 68 percent of Asian Indians aged 5 and older speak a language other than English, only 21 percent do not speak English very well. Should marketers go out of their way to reach a group that has little problem accessing the information and advertisements already out there?  Most definitely,  says Jain.
If you want to win Asian-Indian customers, you have to participate in their communities,  says Pradip Kothari.  You don t have to spend a lot of money for
 If you want to win Asian-Indian customers, you have to participate in their communities. 
name recognition a little goes a long way.  Rajiv Khanna, president of the New York City based India-America Chamber of Commerce, a national organization with more than 300 members, agrees.  Become involved with organizations such as ours. Advertise in community newspapers and on Indian cable TV. Network with Indian groups; sponsor Indian cultural events. 
One way to contact Asian-Indian consumers is to get on the information highway.  The Internet is a wonderful resource for keeping informed about business affairs,  says Bryn Mawr dean Sonya Mehta, who points out that there are more than a dozen newsgroups for Asian-Indian subscribers on the Net (see  Taking It Further ).
Asian Indians also keep tabs on each other and informed about news at home through a host of Indian newspapers and magazines published in the U.S. The choices range from the 25-year-old weekly India Abroad to an array of glossy monthly magazines with cultural and business features. Iselin, New Jersey, has local cable TV geared to its large Asian community, and cable offerings on such networks as TVAsia, Eye on Asia, and Vision of Asia offer programming of interest to the market. Local radio programming is also important to Asian Indians as a vehicle for disseminating information about Indian culture and events.
 Targeted media are available,  says SUNY Buffalo s Jain.  There are even specialty mail-order lists that target Asian Indians. But even more important than media advertising is the power of word of mouth. Indians talk to each other; they share information, recipes, news. They remember companies and organizations that sponsor Indian events. Reaching key opinion leaders will guarantee that your product or service quickly reaches the entire market. 
TAKING IT FURTHER
For more information about the demographics of Asian Indians, see  Asian and Pacific Islanders in the U.S.: 1990, CP-35,  available from the Government Printing Office at (202) 512-1800. Immigration data are available from the Immigration and Naturalization Service; telephone (202) 376-3066. The Statistical Record of Asian Americans ($105) is published by Gale Research, Inc.; telephone (313) 9612242. Foreign-Born Professionals in the United States, by Leon F. Bouvier and David Simcox, is available from the Center for Immigration Studies; telephone (202) 466-8185. India-Net is an online communication service for people of Indian origin residing outside of India; for more information, contact Gaurang Desai, gdesai@megatest.com. Info-India is a volunteer-written digest of Indian newspapers; contact Vishal Sharma, vishal@spetses.ece. ucsb.edu. Prakash reviews about 60 Indian publications a day; contact Arvind Sitaram, asita-ram@us.oracle.com. The Worldwide Indian Network lists useful documents for Indians in the U.S.; contact Biswanath Halder, bhalder@lynx.dac.neu.edu.
187
The Ethnic Legacy
Ethnicity is often associated with immigrants and with importation of culture, language, stories, and foods from foreign shores. Appalachian, western, and other regional ethnicities are evidence of multigenerational ethnic cultural development within the American reality. The persistent, ongoing process of humanity expressed in unique and intriguing folkways, dialect languages, myths, festivals, and foods displays another enduring and public dimension of ethnicity. As this unit's articles illustrate, ethnic experiences may be less foreign and alien than most imagine them to be.
The contributions and concerns of various ethnic immigrant groups over many generations provided a deep weave and pattern to the material and social history of America. Today we see a consciousness of ethnic tradition, exasperation and anger about stereotypes, and efforts to institutionalize attention to groups. Change and ethnicity are not contradictory, for each generation creates anew its ethnicity, which, alongside other affinities, affiliations, and loyalties, helps to guide our interactions. Present concerns of ethnic groups include language, preservation of neighborhoods, ethnic studies, and the rearticulation of historical claims to fairness, justice, and equity.
Perhaps the most obvious oscillation between celebration of achievement and concern about fairness is seen in the legacies of ancestry-conscious persons and groups. Should such populations be denied their distinctiveness through absorption into the mass of modernity, or can their distinctiveness accompany them into mainstream modern American identities? Their ethnicity is not a form of diminished existence; they are "Americans Plus"  Americans with a multicultural affinity and competencies in more than one culture.
The winds of political change in Ireland an the Middle East, and Eastern and Central Eu the saliency of ethnicity and the varied textun relations. In America the ongoing affinity of et lations to the nations of their origins is expresse as well as obvious ways. These articles explair mission of ethnic tradition in music and sugg< between religion and ethnicity. The story of 1 tion of ethnicity and religion is curiously expt etymology of the Greek word ethnikos (i.e., Gentile, or pagan people of the ancient Me< world). Though such philological roots no Ic our principal understanding of ethnicity, the of social affinity and cultural affiliation elabon following articles about ethnics deepens our and understanding of ethnicity a changing ye aspect of human identity and social cohesiver
Looking Ahead: Challenge Questions
How does the ethnicity of an earlier era s tension between worlds of meaning discussed
Comment on the idea that the legacy of m cestral origins and ethnic identities of European rom an earlier era in America argues for the pc vancy and their marginality to the central etl of our time.
What is
