A Century of Language Barriers to Migration in India

Latika Chaudhary, Yannick Dupraz and James Fenske
Additional contact information
Latika Chaudhary: Naval Postgraduate School
Yannick Dupraz: Paris Dauphine University, PSL University, LEDA, CNRS, IRD
James Fenske: Department of Economics, University of Warwick

The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) from University of Warwick, Department of Economics

Abstract: Combining detailed data on language and migration across colonial Indian districts in 1901 with a gravity model, we find origin and destination districts separated by more dissimilar languages saw less migration. We control for the physical distance between origin-destination pairs, several measures of dissimilarity in geographic characteristics, as well as origin and destination fixed effects. The results are robust to a regression discontinuity design that exploits spatial boundaries across language groups. We also find linguistic differences predict lower migration in 2001. Cultural channels are a small part of the link from linguistic diversity to lower migration. Rather, the evidence suggests communication and information channels are more important.

Keywords: Migration; Linguistic Diversity; India JEL Codes: N35; O15; Z13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cul, nep-his and nep-sea
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/research/w ... erp_1580-_fenske.pdf

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wrk:warwec:1580

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) from University of Warwick, Department of Economics Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Margaret Nash ().