“You Should Have Thought about What Would Happen to Us”: Queer South Asians and Transnational Familial Solidarity

This paper examines the lives of Queer South Asian immigrants in the US as they “do family” across their countries of origins and destination. I focus particularly on “coming out” narratives and the impact that “coming out” as LGBTQ+ has on transnational South Asian families. Based on 30-indepth qualitative interviews, archival material, and web content analyses of queer South Asian websites and blogs, the findings demonstrate the centrality of the transnational, extended, and multigenerational family in “coming out narratives”. Findings further show that “coming out” is fraught and a multilayered process that disrupts familial solidarity and the conventional, heteropatriarchal - expectations around the circulation of care and expectations of caregiving and results in nuanced reorganization of solidarities, expectations, and care. Theoretically, this paper contributes to the broader scholarship on sociology of sexualities – especially, to the work on “sexual migrants” as well as to the broader scholarship on transnational families by queering the conversation of families and circulation of care.