Alienated and Marginalised: The Social Integration of the Second Generation South Asian Muslims into Australian Society

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to research the level of social integration of second generation Muslim immigrants of six South Asian communities in Melbourne, who, either had arrived in Australia as accompanied children with their parents or born here. As a lack of information existed relative to their social integration into Australian society, a detailed research study was conducted through a semi-structured questionnaire survey, involving 117 respondents, both male and female, from Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Sri-Lanka, Maldives Island and Myanmar, during the November 2016 and March 2017 period. The findings of this study shows that the second generation Muslims from six South Asian nations are young city dwellers and a majority of them are less optimistic about life in Australia. In today’s Australia, there is still evidence of widespread discrimination against Muslims and especially through employment practices. This research has shown that the younger Muslims from six communities in Melbourne, are more likely to be unemployed, under-employed and living in poverty. Despite their levels of education, Muslims are less likely to work in the professions and less likely to be granted a job interview than the average Australians and receive significantly less economic returns for their level of education than other Australians. This study shows that the significant differences between Muslims and Australian society are found in religiosity, gender roles and sexual norms. However, in practice, Muslims are not developing a totally separate ‘sub-culture’ from the mainstream culture as is evident in the Netherlands, France or Germany. Basic cultural values of migrants appear to change in conformity with the predominant culture of the Australian society. This research has shown that the second generation Muslim migrants, a majority of them have been partially but functionally integrated into the host society, keeping some or more of their own cultural values intact. The results of this study has revealed that it has undermined the previous assumptions on the ground that the second generation Muslim migrants from South Asia would do much better in terms of improving their ‘level of social integration’ than their first generational counter parts in Melbourne. It is apparent from this study that a large section of the second generation Muslims from those six communities, have already been alienated and marginalised in the broader Australian society.