Papers Session: Precarity and Survival in Urban Asia
Abstract for Online Program Book (maximum 150 words)
This study interrogates the assumption that hyper-diverse global cities naturally achieve religious pluralism. Utilizing a dual methodology of historical analysis and ongoing ethnographic fieldwork among scholars, professionals, and faith leaders, the research argues that the realization of Mumbai's unifying civic ideal is a highly contested, continuous process. Rather than a seamless byproduct of demographic proximity, everyday interreligious engagement is actively complicated by spatial segregation, majoritarian political climates, and the lingering trauma of historical ruptures, requiring calculated, spatialized labor to navigate a deeply layered metropolis.