Culture shock on Southall Broadway: re-thinking ‘second-generation’ return through ‘geographies of Punjabiness’

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This paper explores geographies of Punjabiness within Britain in order to engage critically with the recent literature on diasporic return. I begin by drawing attention to the established geographies of Punjabi settlement in Britain, as illustrated by the Thandi coach route maps. This paper considers the significance of these inter-connected hubs of Punjabiness for the multiple identities of the ‘second generation’. I examine life history interviews with ‘second-generation’ Punjabis who grew up in provincial cities and towns off the Thandi route maps – an increasing quantity among Punjabis in Britain. I explore how they construct places like Southall Broadway and Soho Road as Punjabi and go on day trips to these places, as part of their quest for a more authentic identity in the context of their own lives. I show that these places, too, can be crucibles of diasporic nostalgia, exploration of identity and a phenomenological sense of Punjabiness, at times pleasurable and at times unsettling. I suggest that these experiences are akin to diasporic return, speaking to a wider critique about the fetishizing of national borders and the need to decouple diaspora from the idea of originary homelands.