Urban diaspora space: Rural–urban migration and the production of unequal urban spaces

Abstract

Rural–urban migration contributes to urban growth across the world. However, the processes of becoming urban are not equal for all migrants, nor are their role in producing and transforming urban space. By regarding the urban as an ‘urban diaspora space’, this paper provides a new framework for understanding the unequal process of becoming urban by examining how migrant agency and translocal belonging translate into exclusionary practices in the production of urban diaspora space. The paper draws on empirical research, including a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods in Birtamode, an emerging urban centre in Nepal. The paper opens with an introduction of the ‘urban diaspora space’ as a conceptual framework drawing on existing writings on diaspora, translocality and transient urban spaces. Following this, the analysis demonstrates how a diasporic religious community emerges among diasporic subjects and how it translates into social and political communities that come to define social and political agendas within the urban space. By treating the urban as a diasporic space, the paper demonstrates how diasporic communities form spaces in which migrants can regain the status and positionality they had in their rural places of origin, thus enabling a discussion of processes of inclusion and exclusion in the production of unequal urban spaces. The paper concludes that the urban diaspora space can unveil how social and political geographies are reproduced in the urban environment by creating unequal urban spaces.