Exclusion by Design: Postcolonial Consciousness and the Indian Female Migrant Architect in the United Kingdom

Abstract

This article analyzes in-depth empirical data from interviews with 43 female architects who migrated from India to the United Kingdom, using thematic analysis following Braun and Clarke. Theoretically, the article is informed by a gender analysis and a postcolonial lens, utilizing Bhabha's notion of ambivalence to demonstrate how our interviewees' qualifications and work experience were rendered unintelligible by the national bureaucracy and occupational closure mechanisms they encountered upon arrival. The architecture profession is of particular interest because its development in India was significantly influenced by the British Empire, with many shared systems and regulations, shaping the expectations of our respondents for a smooth transfer of their credentials. Our findings demonstrate how the respondents displayed agency and a “postcolonial consciousness” in negotiating the challenges put in their path, thus simultaneously perceiving some of the processes and systems they encountered as designed to exclude them while also seeking ways to navigate around these. A lack of UK work experience hindered them from taking their professional exams to register in the United Kingdom, and without UK registration, they in turn were unable to secure suitable employment to qualify for registration, which created a cycle of exclusion by design. Gender complicated their marginalization within a national bureaucracy that could not receive these women as highly skilled workers in their own right and where migration had, for many, resulted in their sudden positioning as dependents. Their ability to frame these experiences with what we term “postcolonial consciousness” meant that they were able to contextualize the hurdles they faced despite their highly skilled profiles.