The best bachelor’s thesis of the faculty: Obwaldnerin examines Instagram profiles of Tamil secondas and secondos
Shivaswini Mathiyaparanam repeatedly deals with Tamil secondas and secondos. Your latest study was even recognized as the best bachelor’s thesis of an entire faculty. It is no coincidence that the topic is important to the 24-year-old daughter of Tamil immigrants.
Shivaswini Mathiyaparanam from Sarnen delivered the best bachelor’s thesis in the Faculty of Cultural and Social Sciences.
Image: Carmen Epp (Sarnen, June 26, 2024)
Although she was born in Sarnen and grew up in Obwalden, her physical appearance and name reveal that Shivaswini Mathiyaparanam’s cultural background lies somewhere else. At least in theory: Her parents fled from Sri Lanka to Obwalden, where they had a son and later a daughter Shivaswini.
Her father worked as head chef at the “Hirschen” in Sarnen, and her mother helped him as an assistant cook. And the daughter herself attended the Tami school since she was four years old. Her parents introduced her to many of the cultural traditions of her country of origin. Through dance, singing and the Tamil school as well as various events, Shivaswini Mathiyaparanam had contact with the Tamil community, especially on weekends. “There were hardly any Tamils in my school,” remembers the now 24-year-old.
When she also attended the Tamil school in Lucerne during high school in Sarnen, Shivaswini Mathiyaparanam began to engage more theoretically with the society and values of the country from which her parents had fled. And she began to help families in the canton of Obwalden who had fled from Sri Lanka. “For the parents I was the daughter who helps with authorities or administrative matters, and for the children I was the big sister who helps or supports them in learning German in order to adapt to the systems in Switzerland – similar to a mentor.” So Shivaswini Mathiyaparanam became the linchpin of the Tamil community in Obwalden and thus a bridge builder between cultures.
Live and research between two cultures
This area of tension between Western and Tamil culture increasingly concerned Shivaswini Mathiyaparanam from a scientific perspective. So she wrote her high school diploma thesis about arranged marriages among Tamil-Hindu secondos. Even while studying social and communication sciences at the University of Lucerne, she didn’t let the topic go. In a seminar paper she examined how Tamil secondas and secondos deal with taboo topics.
She ultimately dedicated her bachelor’s thesis to the topic. The 24-year-old examined the question of how second-generation Tamils present themselves and their values between their family culture of origin and the influences of the Swiss environment. To find out, Shivaswini Mathiyaparanam examined twenty Instagram profiles of Tamil secondas and secondos from all over German-speaking Switzerland, asked them a list of questions and examined five of them in a personal interview.
She wanted to find out how the respondents balance their culture of origin and the influences of their Swiss environment, whether their representations on Instagram reflect a fusion of both cultures or whether they tend to align themselves more strongly with one of the cultures. “It turned out that the majority of those examined tried – perhaps unconsciously – to represent both cultures,” explains Shivaswini Mathiyaparanam. “This hybridization creates something like a third culture.” A phenomenon that can probably also be seen in her own Instagram profile, as the 24-year-old adds.
Recognition for work that sets new standards
The bachelor’s thesis entitled “Digital and Real Identities: The Transcultural Self-Representation of Tamil Secondas and Secondos in Switzerland”, which she submitted in the fall semester of 2023, was recognized in March as the best bachelor’s thesis of the entire Faculty of Cultural and Social Sciences at the University of Lucerne. “What Shivaswini Mathiyaparanam presents here far exceeds the expectations of a bachelor’s thesis,” said Boris Presivic, adjunct professor of cultural studies, in his laudatory speech. It is “ambitious” in its theoretical foundation and empirical implementation and even sets new standards.
These words fill the graduate with pride, as she says. It is also a recognition of the work that she really enjoyed putting into her bachelor’s thesis. She even had to control herself, as Shivaswini Mathiyaparanam says. “There are still so many aspects that I could have shed light on!”
So it’s no surprise that the 24-year-old remains loyal to her studies and research. She started her master’s degree in management, organization and culture at the University of St.Gallen in September. Just like her bachelor’s degree, she will also complete her master’s degree part-time. She is currently working part-time as a recruiting assistant at a personnel consulting and placement company in Winterthur. On the one hand, because she needs the variety. On the other hand, it is important to her to always have a foot in the professional world. This is also likely to be culturally dependent, as she says. “Since I grew up in a family where my parents were unable to receive an education, I know how important a certain level of security is.”
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