One Coin, Two Sides

by Jaswant Singh Sachdev

Overview

Dr. Jaswant Singh Sachdev, once again, echoes the themes of duality and immigrant-assimilation in his second book, One Coin, Two Sides. The title is a slight variation of the phrase, Two sides of the same coin, which refers to closely related features of one idea. As Dr. Sachdev suggests throughout the book, the process of assimilation ideally involves maintaining the best of one s own culture while adopting select customs of the new country, one s adopted homeland. An immigrant s experience is, thus, like a coin. The beliefs and traditions that the immigrant grew up with in the motherland are minted on the obverse side, while the attitudes and customs that the immigrant adopts in the new homeland are gradually stamped on the reverse side. How to navigate two cultures, that sometimes conflict, is at the crux of One Coin, Two Sides. Dr. Sachdev examines lifestyle matters, health concerns, religious practices, and historical events among other topics, to provide readers with not only answers to questions but, on the other side of the coin, with questions to long-held presumptions. Dr. Sachdev writes about immigrant issues based on his conversations with friends and readers of his articles that have been appearing in local and national ethnic weeklies, as well as from his own life. As a child, Dr. Sachdev and his Sikh family were displaced to East Punjab in India by the partition of 1947. Later, after studying at New York Medical College, he moved to Phoenix, Arizona, to practice medicine and raise his family. The immigrant experience is one that Dr. Sachdev has lived first-hand. The book he has produced is like a rare coin that shines with priceless insight and uncommon intelligence, and is a valuable addition to Indian subcontinent diaspora literature as well as for those born and raised in the West.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940014640701
Publisher:	Inkwell Productions, LLC
Publication date:	06/27/2012
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	340
File size:	148 KB

About the Author

Dr. Jaswant Singh Sachdev, M.D., F.A.A.N., a board certified Fellow of the American Academy of Neurology is a resident of Phoenix, Arizona, U.S.A. Before migrating to United States in 1972, he completed his post-graduate studies in medicine and taught at the Government Medical College, Patiala, (Pb.), India, where he had a bright academic career and was awarded several Gold Medals including one for the Best Graduate of the MBBS class of 1967. A well-known multifaceted community volunteer/leader, he has been a leading member of the Sikh community for over a decade to prepare and serve free dinner to local homeless citizens on monthly basis. In 2004 he was declared the Outstanding Arizona Asian American Citizen for his various services including his work for Sikh awareness. Besides being a physician of repute, Dr. Sachdev is an author with an interest in Indian diaspora matters. Several of his essays have been published in many ethnic weeklies in U.S. and Canada to high acclaim. His first book, Square Pegs, Round Holes dealt with similar issue and was very well received. One Coin, Two Sides, is a further collection of essays highlighting cultural similarities and dissimilarities between Eastern lifestyle of NRIs in a dominant Western culture.