A sociological perspective

This project is a sociological project, so you can find sociological elements in each theme. That said, this page is dedicated to the urban sociology of the neighborhood, and you will find below some sociological fieldwork I have done. 

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As we mentioned in the history walking tour, the towers of the Olympiades Esplanade were under-occupied when the boat people arrived in the 1970s. However, with the increase in rent prices, many of these people coming from ex-Indochina have moved elsewhere in Paris or to the Parisian suburbs. This means that currently, the Asian district is not a neighborhood where mainly people of Asian origin reside, but rather an economic, social, and cultural hub that revolves around supermarkets like Tang Frères and Paris Store as well as cultural associations. Asians come from the suburbs, or even from other cities, to run businesses; others even come from neighboring countries to do their shopping and attend cultural events such as the Lunar New Year parade. 

 

The Masséna Center, for example, is located next to the Paris periphery and has a giant underground parking lot for families who come from the Parisian suburbs on weekends to do their shopping. Therefore, we can see a high concentration of people of Asian origin walking around the neighborhood, but many of them actually do not live there.

Another thing to note: even if 60% of the Asians in the 13th come from Cambodia, the majority of the Asians in the 13th come from the Chinese diaspora and therefore have cultural and linguistic links with China in addition to Vietnam, Cambodia, or Laos.