A feature published in the December 2015 edition of Seattle Magazine examines how Seattle’s South Asian population is becoming more visible in the philanthropic community. Amy Bhatt, an assistant professor of gender and women’s studies, researches South Asian migration trends in the tech industry and provided perspective on how the philanthropic community has grown over time.
“There’s a lot of wealth that has accumulated here,” Bhatt said in the article. As a result, the first generation of international tech workers in the Pacific Northwest has helped incubate a number of nonprofits and foundations.
Bhatt also observed in the article that more South Asians are emerging as leaders in the nonprofit sector: “You’re seeing more markers of South Asian leaders in general…in American organizations and institutions,” says Bhatt, citing the local examples of Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, Seattle City Councilmember Kshama Sawant and state Senator Pramila Jayapal. Bhatt said that earlier leaders have paved the way for the new generation. “As a result of a multitiered, multigenerational community, you have much richer examples of South Asian leaders in philanthropy.”
Bhatt recently appeared in a PBS documentary about the 1965 Immigration Act and she’s author of Roots and Reflections: South Asians in the Pacific Northwest. Read more about her work on the gender and women’s studies website.
Read “South Asians are becoming more visible in the philanthropic community” in Seattle Magazine.
Image: Amy Bhatt. Photo by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.
