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Paper abstract:

Asian communities in the USA continue to increase. According to the US Department of the Interior, between 1999 and 2019, more than 100,000 Central Asia migrants received the status of legal permanent residents of the United States. The areas of their residence in the USA are predominantly New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia. Although the diasporic Central Asian community has already lived for 30 years in the USA, the information about them is primarily sporadic and chiefly journalistic. This paper explores Central Asian migrant women’s integration in the abovementioned cities by studying their commuting experiences on public transport.

It is known that mobility in the cities above requires migrant women to undertake trips, which are most likely frequent but can vary in duration. The length of these trips depends chiefly on how far away the workplace. Their physical and bodily movements are usually accompanied by interactions with diverse passengers. Exchanges can also evoke emotions and feelings. Women may think, plan, get angry, get well, and get dreaming. They also expose their identity in public spaces and negotiate their identity implicitly or explicitly within the area of public transport. Transport use is, therefore, a social and practical experience.

Moreover, the choice and usage of a transport mode is not only a financial decision but also a social and economic one considering travel mode, road infrastructure, and norms. These aspects reflect a person’s identity related to marital role, kinship, education, ethnicity, and other identical patterns. Referring to Hanson’s statement on gendered ‘empowerment or disempowerment’ (Hanson, 2010), public transport can be – a physical means to realize social and personal developments. Still, at the same time, it can be a danger-prone and contested arena, producing expected and unexpected difficulties.

It is well-known that kinship in a migrant environment is not necessarily based on consanguinity or marriage. Relatives can also arrive from one region, district, or village. For example, in Philadelphia and Staten Island, Kyrgyz migrants from the Talas and Issyk-Kul regions consider themselves relatives and try to help each other in every possible way. Migrants from Uzbekistan chiefly reside in the New York area as they can find many ways to connect themselves with counterparts who came to the USA many years ago. Thus, mobility gives migrant women many chances to build social networks, interact and take advantage of opportunities to integrate into the host society and acquire, ‘mobility capital’.