Assimilating in the Netherlands: The Intergenerational Effects of Assimilation and Non-Transmission of Indo's in the Netherlands
Summary
A substantial body of anthropological research to the history of Nederlands-Indië and the Indo’s has been conducted. Subsequently, research has been done to the experience of the Indo’s that came to the Netherlands during or after Indonesian independence. However, little empirical awareness has been received in this domain. I hereby propose that a light can be shed on the identity-making of these Indo-Europeans and the impediments they encounter(ed) whilst assimilating in Dutch society. Overall, negatively valued migrants might experience damaged selfesteem, identity denial and/or intolerance and racist utterances from the receiving country. This often happens in diverse societies that, willingly or unwillingly, promote inequality. Which, in this case, points to the three-way division that highlighted the superiority of the European race. Therefore, I also involve external processes, such as discriminatory practices and ‘Othering’, to explain the construction of Indo-identities. The main argument I want to make within this thesis concerns the intergenerational (non-)transmission of trauma that originated from the Dutch integration policy after 1950. This integration policy was experienced as an assimilationist policy, and I argue that it (still) shapes the identity-making of my research participants.