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Abstract
This article investigates India’s professionals’ tourist mobilities during on-site assignments in continental Europe. The concept of experiential cultural capital is introduced to highlight the sociocultural symbolic significance of experiences of travelling for leisure enabled by one’s professional career. The study (conducted between 2007 and 2013) is based on ethnographic research online and in-depth face-to-face interviews with 76 Indian expatriates working in the information, communication and technology (ICT) sector in Brussels. This complementary approach of online and offline research enabled the observation of practices of status distinction, which deepened the understanding of Indian professionals’ tourist mobility. The data of the lived experiences of leisure travelling enabled by professional career trajectories illustrate practices of capital accumulation. In addition, they show how India’s youth, inscribed in new economy sectors, such as the ICT sector, seize the volatile opportunities offered by changing global economic and political conditions. Moreover, this research indicates how occupational identity is intertwined with particular practices of leisure travelling as the organisational culture might influence leisure opportunities. Therefore, by participating in and managing this symbolic resource of tourist mobility, professionals signal their economic success to their family and peers in order to be recognised as such.
Notes
1. According to Belgian legislation, highly skilled professionals are people who completed higher education or obtained that level by experience and who are employed in that capacity for a minimum gross annual salary laid down in the Royal Decree (€38,665 for the year 2013). In order to meet the needs of the labour market, migration policy has been made more flexible towards the employment of highly skilled third country nationals. Since 2003–2004, there has been a steady increase in the number of B work permits delivered for highly qualified personnel and managers from India. Mostly the ICT sector attracts economic migrants from India (Roos, Citation2013b).
2. Orkut (2004–2014) was a social networking website owned and operated by Google and was mostly visited by Brazilian and Indian users.
3. The Schengen Area consists of 26 European countries which have a common visa policy and functions as a single country with respect to international travel purposes.