Aziz Ansari and the Evolution of Indian Americans

United States:  The other night, I was walking in downtown San Francisco after work near two other pedestrians, two men probably in their mid-twenties. I could overhear parts of their conversation when one of them said, “I hate technology. I forwarded the email to her, and then she posted it on . . . .” It seemed to be a discussion about singles, dating, and technology and the first thing I thought about was, of course, Aziz Ansari!

On Sept. 7, 2013, I attended a comedy show of acclaimed comedian and “Parks and Recreation” star Aziz Ansari at the Victoria Theater in Dayton, Ohio.

Most of his comedy was about dating and relationships in today’s era of smartphones and texting. Ansari emphasizes the awkwardness and difficulty of dating in modern life, drawing upon some of his own experiences, those of his friends and even through reading an audience member’s texts on her phone. The audience, made up of primarily single young adults, responded to the act and thoroughly enjoyed themselves. Even long-time married audience members like myself could enjoy the social commentary of how texting changes the ebb and flow of relationships, changes the power dynamic, and creates new uncertainties and anxiety in the dating process.

In an article, Ansari talks about his fascination of how modern technology fits in today’s world of romance: “I’m super-fascinated by how texting and modern technology have made the early stages of our romantic interactions frustrating — that roller coaster of emotions you go through when you text some girl you are into, asking about dinner. You don’t hear back for hours, and you are going crazy. Then you look on Instagram, and she’s, like, posting a photo of her dog and you’re like, What the f*#!? Why are you Instagramming photos of your puppy, you rude piece of s*#!? Respond to my text! I started talking about stuff like that and was stunned by how much it seemed to resonate — such a specific, modern conundrum that has become almost universal. In a few hours of no texting, you can go from elation at meeting someone to total horror and anger.”

Furthermore, Ansari has been given an advance of $3.5M from Penguin Press to write a book on this topic. Here’s how the publisher describes the book: The untitled book, which is expected to be published in September 2015, “will provide an investigation into what Ansari argues is an entirely new era for singles, in which the basic issues facing a single person — whom we meet, how we meet them, and what happens next — have been radically altered by new technologies.”

At first glance, it feels quite surprising that a comedian like Ansari would be able to credibly write such a social commentary about dating. But when you peel back the onion, it isn’t that surprising for an intelligent, socially curious comedian to be able to do so. As a comedian, Ansari is constantly observing and finding humor in the human condition. And being single in New York, he’s likely experienced the trials and tribulations of the dating game in perhaps the most competitive and challenging place in the country to build relationships.

As Scott Moyers from Penguin Press says, “So much of Aziz Ansari’s brilliant humor comes from grasping the hidden forces that govern our everyday lives. I’m delighted but not surprised that he is the one who is going to make sense of the strange new world that singles have to navigate today.”

Now, what I really find surprising about this book and the willingness of both the public and publisher to have Ansari serve as an expert on dating in the decade of the 2010s is not that he is a comedian, but that he is an Indian American.

Ansari was born in 1983 in Columbia, S.C., to immigrant professional parents from Tamil Nadu. South Carolina was never a hotbed for Indian Americans: the 2010 Census shows that in Columbia, there were 878 Indians, or 0.7 percent of the total city population. Given that level of diversity, it’s unlikely that any Indian American, even a funny, handsome one, would have been in dating demand.

Given that background, it does feel like an unexpected and remarkable development that an Indian American raised in South Carolina will be writing a credible book about broad, mainstream dating and relationships applicable to all races, ethnicities, and ages in the U.S. in today’s era.

Of course, without the celebrity comedian status, it’s not clear if another young Indian American could garner visibility as a dating and relationship commentator for all Americans.

But there are more and more Indian Americans in the public eye today. Examples include Sanjay Gupta as a health care expert on CNN, here in the Bay Area Raj Mathai is a local news and sports anchor, actors on mainstream sitcoms such as Mindy Kaling and Kal Penn, and authors and journalists such as Checklist Manifesto author Atul Gawande. Indian Americans have been recognized at the top of their field for decades in medicine, academia, science, mathematics, and business, but sustained visibility in the media and entertainment feels like a new phenomenon. And particularly in an area such as social commentary on dating habits for all Americans where Indians wouldn’t be expected to be taken seriously, that is a major shift in the placement of Indian Americans in American society.

(Apurva Desai lives in the Silicon Valley where he has worked for leading Bay Area Internet and Mobile companies ranging from large giants to emerging startups for the last decade. You can find him on Twitter @apurvadesai and at his personal site apurvadesai.com.)
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