A marriage of East and West

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Earlier this month, the NYT ran a wedding announcement for the marriage of Nicolette Bird and Ravi Mehta. At first this seemed like the usual thing: one person with family in Calcutta, went to college in Calcutta, marrying another person with family in New York who went to Harvard.

Except …

In this case it was Nicolette Bird who is from Calcutta and works in Bollywood, and it’s Ravi Mehta who was born in Colorado, with his parents and job in New York City.

The bride, 25, is an actress and model and has had roles in the Bollywood films “Rock On,” released in 2008, and “Striker,” released earlier this month. As a model, she has appeared in television commercials and magazine advertisements in India. She graduated from Bhowanipur Education Society College in Calcutta. She is a daughter of Edwina Bird and Nicholas Bird of Calcutta.

The bridegroom, 28, is the founder and managing director of Steadview Capital Management of New York, a hedge fund that focuses on companies in India. He graduated from Harvard. The bridegroom is a son of Geeta Mehta and Krishen Mehta of New York. [NYT]

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p>And why not? We hate it when people ask us “Really, where are you from” do we think this only happens to brown folks in America? Heck, this week people sent me two links to Indian TV ads which had anxiety about hybridity as their main theme:

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No word yet on what the Mehta-Bird’s will be eating at home, but given that he grew up in Japan I imagine their dinner table negotiations are quite intense. Or maybe they just get takeout.

154 thoughts on “A marriage of East and West”

  1. I do think though, that it is probably relatively easier for an Indian male to marry a non-Indian than for an Indian female. That’s just a hunch at this point though.
    I suspect Razib has the study bookmarked given how often he references it, but I seem to recall that the numbers bore out the opposite conclusion. Indian women are more likely to marry out than Indian men.

    its even. a statisitcally insiginficant advantage to the women:

    http://www.asian-nation.org/interracial.shtml

  2. “I agree, but it’s stupid to assume that someone’s name exposes their ethnicity, that’s all i’m saying.”

    You’re just splitting hairs then. it 98% of the time exposes it. Thats like saying “its stupid to cross a crosswalk when the light is red” because 1% of the time someone might run a red light.

  3. “But I understand what you’re saying, it’s almost instinctive to associate names with certain cultures”

    of course it is, and 99% of the time you’d be right.

  4. I stopped skimming after the comment about 80,000 Anglo-Indians in all of India. So if someone else has made this point, apologies.

    80,000 has to be an undercount or stringent classification. I am sure there are that many in Vepery, Kilpauk and Purasawakkam in Madras alone. Or OK, include Bangalorean Anglo-Indians too. Still, my point is…something is not quite right with that number.