Cultural Identity Formation In Exile: The Case Of Kashmiri Migrant Youth

Cultural Identity Formation in Exile: The case of Kashmiri Migrant Youth

Introduction
One of the most important aspect of the development of an individual is the development of the individual’s identity. Identity refers to “a definition placed on self” which has two simultaneous characteristics. The first is a sense of sameness or continuity across various situations and over a period of time and the second is a difference that makes an individual distinct from others. The formation of an identity is imperative to ensure an individual’s psychological and social well-being and must always be considered within the socio-cultural context which the individual exists in.
Durkheim in the year 1895 paved the way towards accepting culture as playing a very important role in an individual’s definition of themselves (Usborne & Sablonniere, 2014).
This belief was carried forward by Erik Erikson as he defined ‘Identity Formation’ as the “process of exploring and selecting knowledge about oneself from the social environment” (Erikson, 1968 as cited in Eryigit, 2010).

According to Erikson, adolescents from

Furthermore, the adjustment to the alien culture in these areas involved a number of cultural changes that the community members had to undergo. These included a change in their clothing patterns for they wore thick woollen garments called ‘pheran’ back in Kashmir which wasn’t possible any longer due to the weather in their destination cities. The same could also be sensed in the loss of the use of ‘kangri’ which was a part of everyday life in kashmir but has now become an obsolete cultural symbol for the community. Another important cultural change that was experienced by this community was the decrease in religious enthusiasm when it came to their important festivals especially the festival of ‘shivratri’ (Malhotra,