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Watan A Study of the South Asian American Diaspora & A Case for Spatial Identity Development

B. Arch Final Thesis, Spring 2019 under Professor J.T. Bachman

The Watan Master Plan on Brandon Avenue is an opportunity to build a strong and unique environment for various marginalized groups at the University of Virginia. By finding homogeny within diversity, the plan allows individual identities to form in their own respective spaces while encouraging interaction amongst those new identities.

The goal of Watan is to explore and understand the ways in which South Asian American identities form and to provide a framework, system, or guide to cultivate, maintain, and mobilize cohesively generations to come.

Watan seeks to answer the questions as to why this cohesive front does not exist on college campuses across the country, what are the structural components which have maintained this fragmented status quo, and how can a reform of the architecture and systems in place prove to be beneficial in fostering this unity?

Process