Diaspora and cultural heritage: the case of Indians in Canada

The present paper examines the historical and contemporary context of Indian communities in Canada from a cultural heritage perspective and analyses the processes of migration, settlement and cultural identity. It also examines the challenges of developing museum exhibits which depict the Indian diaspora in Canada. Despite its colourful history and its growing size and prominence in Canadian society, the Indian diaspora has not been the subject of much interest by Canadian museums. While recognising the necessity of working with local communities and thereby reflecting local concerns, it is submitted that any museum exhibit attempting to portray the complex set of experiences of the Indian diaspora in Canada should include some portrayal of the highly marginalised position which the Indian community faced when it first established themselves in the early 1900s. In addition to this historical focus, any attempt to portray the contemporary Indian diaspora needs to portray its growing diversity and its efforts to maintain, and in many cases modify and ‘hybridise’, cultural practices. Such a display would also have to reflect the influence of transnational forces on the contemporary Indian diaspora. Ultimately, efforts by museums to develop exhibits reflecting the Indian presence in Canada will only further the aims of its widely praised state policy of multiculturalism.     

Navigating labels,seeking recognition for victimhood: Diaspora activism after mass-atrocities

This article analyses diaspora mobilization for transitional justice as efforts to gain recognition for victim-based identities. Building on research among diaspora groups from Rwanda and Sri Lanka in North America and Europe, the article investigates how diaspora actors in their quest for victimhood recognition navigate, make use of and challenge labels such as “victim”, “perpetrator”, “genocide”, “survivor” and “terrorist”. The article uses Jacoby's theory of victimhood to draw attention to the diasporic space as particularly conducive for recognition struggles, and discuss the different stages through which victim-based identities are constructed. The empirical examples reveal how serveral competing and interrelated processes towards victimhood recognition are simultaneously at work, and how diaspora actors both refute and creatively make use of categories that assign blame or signal victimhood and resilience.     

The Indian Diaspora in Africa: The Commodification of Hindu Rashtra

A new approach to India’s diaspora has taken place within the wider context of the adoption, in 1991, of a neoliberal economic policy framework. In recent years, Indian private business enterprises have led the way in Africa and this has had an important impact on the state’s conceptualization of the diaspora. New Delhi’s elites actively seek to embrace an objectified ‘globalization’ as a means to benefit powerful externally oriented fractions and the diaspora’s value is measured in its contribution to this project. There has been a determined attempt to commodify the diaspora to serve particular Indian economic interests. However, the current government’s Hindu chauvinism makes the very question of what constitutes a genuine Indian rather narrow. Two factors thus dominate current policy: commodification and categorization. The diaspora in South Africa is discussed as an example where these dynamics can be acutely observed.     

Music to Remember Me By: Technologies of Memory in Home Recording

This article presents ethnographic data on home music recording to advance the concept of technologies of memory as way for interactionists to understand memory work as a practice of self. John Dewey's classic ruminations on memory as process are combined with Tia DeNora's contemporary articulation of music as a technology of the self to explain data on home recording as individually and socially meaningful mnemonic work. This specific case study demonstrates how home recordists use material technologies (technics) and technological practices (techniques) to form and reform the self in everyday life. More generally, this article demonstrates the efficacy of interpretive studies of memory, creativity, technology, and the self in everyday life.     

Diaspora as socio-material assemblage: Political agency in the Kurdish freedom movement's representations of homeland

The proliferation of diasporas has expanded the intricate web of political relations on a global scale. Transnationality has increasingly replaced methodological nationalism, and relationality blurred diaspora's boundaries. This article argues for framing diasporas as socio-material assemblages to capture the political agency of diasporas in action in a transnational space. This highlights diasporas’ ability to forge their transnational political actorness and to expand their power of attractiveness. By tracing ideas and things behind the essential task of representing the homeland, this research explores the connections of the Kurdish freedom movement in Europe, making three main arguments. First, it outlines the existence of transnational infrastructures of solidarity, which highlight a multi-ethnic plurality at work. Second, it illuminates the diasporas’ role in the south–north flow of knowledge and political influence. Third, the article examines the desire which stabilizes the assemblage and makes the circulation of ideas possible and smooth.     

Swaying in time and space: the Chinese Diaspora in the Caribbean and its literary perspectives

Despite that the Chinese in the Caribbean, unlike Africans or East Indians, is vaguely impressive in terms of racial and social impact; their stance and viewpoint are quite unique and insightful. Willi Chen and Jan Lowe Shinebourne, representing Chinese Caribbean Diaspora, are impressive enough with its strong literary impact. They both show the ambivalence acquired in the process of ‘positioning’, as well as the strong heritage of their ancestral mother land of China. Chen’s work is characteristic with its neutral stance of Chinese characters, and Shinebourne makes her protagonists wander with intermingling sense of tradition and progression. This ambivalence, however, can become a positive sway between groups which may be different, conflictive, or even hostile to each other, and that sway can bring a righteous and truthful judgment to the matter. The Chinese Caribbean writings contribute with the dialectic philosophies included in and inherited from Chinese traditions.     

The Politics of Home: Dual Citizenship and the African Diaspora1

In recent decades, more countries have started to recognize dual citizenship. Although overlooked in the literature, Africa is part of this trend with more than half of its governments now permitting their nationals to naturalize elsewhere while retaining home country rights. Why have some African countries embraced dual citizenship for emigrants, while others have not? We examine demographic, political, and economic data broadly across the continent and identify few clear patterns. We then explore the cases of Senegal, Ghana, and Kenya, finding that dual citizenship policies are driven as much by politics as they are by economic or security concerns.     

The Political Influence of Return: From Diaspora to Libyan Transit Returnees

In December 2016, Gambian dictator Jammeh was surprisingly ousted through the ballot box by a democratically motivated opposition. With this remarkable change, tables also turned for Gambian migrants. Gambians abroad were called upon to return and help rebuild the nation, while political interests in host states increased to return “irregular” migrants. In what ways can migrant return be politically influential, especially after a critical juncture as in the Gambia? Current studies fail to consider different types of returnees, including those perceived as highly skilled compared to those seen as low‐skilled. We found that in post‐dictatorial Gambia, both types of returnees have political influence on the new regime. Highly skilled diaspora returnees were explicitly invited as contributors to political developments in the country and thus have a direct political influence. In contrast, low‐skilled returned migrants from Libya are considered as receivers of public goods; yet through claims to political representation they managed to carve out political influence, albeit indirectly.     

Diaspora governance and religion: The (re)production of the Guangze Zunwang cult in the Chinese diaspora

The role of sending states receives little attention in existing studies of transnational religion; another body of literature on diaspora governance gives little scrutiny to the religious dimension of diaspora strategies. This paper attempts to bridge the two bodies of works by exploring the state-directed religious networking in the Chinese diaspora. Through a case study of the Guangze Zunwang cult, it investigates how origin states mobilize migrant religious networks for diaspora engagement and how diaspora communities respond to governing strategies. Different Chinese (non)state agents operate diasporic religious programs—international cultural tourism festivals and deities’ cross-border processions—respectively within and outside the territory. Inspired by the state-directed networking, diaspora groups also launch temple alliances in residential places, yet at the same time, produce alternative networks dedicated to revitalizing the cult. The paper sheds light on the multiplicity and flexibility of diaspora governance and provides further insights into the agency of the diaspora through transnational religious networking.     

The Collective Turkish Home in Vienna: Aesthetic Narratives of Migration and Belonging

ABSTRACT

This article explores how Turkish people in Vienna create a collective sense of belonging and position themselves in a complex web of diasporic relations, through the materiality and aesthetics of their homes. It aims to show how the efforts of displaced people to construct a belonging to the new place of dwelling are intertwined with the aesthetic and material practices of making homes. Based on ethnographic research, it will be argued that a particular “Turkish home” is collectively created through shared aesthetic practices and discourses and serves as a material and social medium both for imagining and building collectivities and for constructing and expressing ambiguities, conflicts, multiplicities and contests, played out in the aesthetics of the everyday. Challenging the common view that homes in diasporic or migratory resettlements reflect past lives and locations or a mixture of two cultures and two sets of different objects associated with them, it will be argued that Turkish homes in Vienna are made through a new and particular aesthetic, which serves to produce and reproduce a communal Turkish narrative of migration to and dwelling in Vienna.     

小议歌曲在法语教学中的运用

音乐能够调节情绪、激发兴趣,促进理解、增强记忆。法语歌曲较好地融合了语音、语言和文化知识,如果选择恰当、教学设计合理,在遵循法语语言知识的学习和各项语言技能训练的前提下,将法语歌曲作为语言学习的辅助材料,既可增加教学内容的趣味性,又可提高教学方式的灵活性。     

Loving America and Longing for Home: Isma'il al-Faruqi and the Emergence of the Muslim Diaspora in North America

In this paper, I weave the experience of an emerging community of Muslim diaspora around a biographical narrative of the Muslim activist and scholar Isma'il al‐Faruqi. Through this narrative, I illustrate that the diasporic experience begins in the place of origin and it does not inevitably lead toward a perpetual hybridization. The latter point is particularly significant because notions of diaspora and hybridity are conceptually linked and are often understood as a unidirectional cutting and mixing between the West and the East, or between the modern and the traditional. Al‐Faruqi's experience shows that, in a Fanonian sense of colonialism, diasporic experience conveys living as a “stranger”, at and away from home. The postcolonial condition has made it possible for ethnically diverse communities of Muslims to reside in the West, but maintain strong connections with their place of origin. Adopting the allegory of the Prophet's migration or hijra, al‐Faruqi constructed a fantastic notion of the ummah and a normative homo islamicus subject. Although he was profoundly influenced by the diversity of the Muslim Student Associations' constituency, al‐Faruqi encouraged Muslims to transcend their differences and sought to conceive a discursively homogenous ummah. Ultimately, however, his project failed because it did not correspond to real life experiences of Muslims of the West. Historically, Muslim communities have negotiated the boundaries of Muslimhood and the social responsibilities it entails, both in their homelands and in their new home in the West — a new home that increasingly becomes hostile to their presence, and thereby further complicates their triangular diaspora/host society/homeland relationship.     

Mothers and Daughters in Historical Perspective: Home,Identity and Double Consciousness in British Pakistanis' Migration and Return

Scholarly interest has increasingly focused on the predicament of second-generation counter-diasporic return migration to an ancestral homeland. The present paper portrays two generations of Pakistani middle class women migrants: two mothers, who arrived in Manchester in the 1970s, and their daughters, who both returned to live in Pakistan, one at the age of 11 and the other in her twenties, to marry. The latter in particular experienced Pakistan as culturally alien and unhomely. In Britain one mother has become extremely pious after 9/11. The paper looks at the moral careers of mothers and daughters, starting from the fact that migration initiates an irreversible process in which everyday, taken-for-granted intimacies and socialities of home and identity are subverted. Refuting simplistic theories of a continuous “transnational field”, it argues that migrants experience “double consciousness”, an awareness of competing rules, expectations and a doubling up of a subject's sense of belonging and alienation, which no return home can reverse.     

Hybrid diaspora and identity-laundering: a study of the return overseas Chinese Vietnamese in Vietnam 1

Among the overseas Vietnamese around the world, many are Chinese Vietnamese. They fled from Vietnam for different political and economic reasons during the 1970s and the 1980s. Many of them have returned to Vietnam since the 1990s to work, invest or retire. What is interesting about these returned Chinese Vietnamese migrants is the fact that when they left Vietnam they were called by the Vietnamese the Hoa (華, Chinese) or Hoa ki?u (華僑, overseas Chinese) by the Vietnamese. This identity was actually one of the reasons for their escape. When they returned, they were lumped together with all other returnees into the category of Vi?t ki?u (越僑, overseas Vietnamese) and enjoyed the special rights offered by the Vi?t ki?u policy of the Vietnamese government, which was aimed at boosting the national economy. Although their ‘Chinese’ identity had once made them to risk their lives by sailing out on the roaring sea, their ‘Vietnamese’ identity brought them back to Vietnam at other turning points in their lives. The shifting identity of these Hoa ki?u-turned-Vi?t ki?u has produced an interesting migration story and an intriguing category of ‘hybrid diaspora.’     

My Room,My Home,My Self

Abstract

The material culture of home cannot be supplanted in its entirety when moving into an aged care facility. When the time comes, the decision of what to take and what to leave behind is not simple. This article presents the balance between practical and emotional considerations in the choice and presence of personal objects in the rooms of residents. Intersubjective relationships between material objects in the room and the people who enter that space is viewed through a narrative lens. In this way, it is the materiality of the room-as-home for the self, which is key. Three major themes relating to the objects in the room of the older person were found to be: 1. Safety, 2. Family, and 3. Home. These themes emerged from ethnographic research in an aged care setting. Participants included residents, their families, care staff, and management of the facility. The article contributes to understandings of material objects as carriers of identity and meaning in an aged care facility.     

Diaspora,Community and Communication: Internet Use in Transnational Haiti

Abstract With its capacity to link many people interactively across great distances, the Internet seems to be the ultimate tool for dispersed ethnic groups wishing to sustain identity in an ‘alien’ land and work in solidarity with those facing challenges at ‘home’. Some theorists speak of the creation of diasporic public spheres arising from creative use of Internet technologies. Nevertheless, scholars working in this area rarely embed their analyses within existing work on the public sphere. In the present study I use insights from public sphere theory to evaluate participants' use of a Haiti Global Village forum. After examining Haiti Global Village, I conclude that such forums offer needed space for civic deliberation and provide a valuable infrastructure for networking. Participants' difficulty in translating these assets into an off‐line project, however, highlights the importance of place‐based social ties. Consideration of the experience of other Haitian forums reinforces the importance of such ties.     

Diaspora,cyberspace and political imagination: the Eritrean diaspora online

Abstract In this article I analyse the Eritrean diaspora and its use of cyberspace to theorize the ways transnationalism and new media are associated with the rise of new forms of community, public spheres and sites of cultural production. The struggle for national independence coincided with the rise of the Internet and the Eritrean diaspora has been actively involved in the new state. Eritreans abroad use the Internet as a transnational public sphere where they produce and debate narratives of history, culture, democracy and identity. Through the web the diaspora has mobilized demonstrators, amassed funds for war, debated the formulation of the constitution, and influenced the government of Eritrea. Through their web postings, ‘Internet intellectuals’ interpret national crises, rearticulate values and construct community. Thus, the Internet is not simply about information but is also an emotion‐laden and creative space. More than simply refugees or struggling workers, diasporas online may invent new forms of citizenship, community and political practices.     

Identifications,communities and connections: intersections of ethnicity and sexuality among diasporic gay men

This paper explores sexual and ethnic-cultural identifications among first- and second-generation gay migrants in Belgium. Based on a theoretical framework highlighting the multiple, fluid and intersectional nature of identifications, 29 in-depth interviews are used to study self-identifications and connections to different communities. Drawing on a diverse sample, three clusters of participants can be distinguished: second-generation migrants, who were born in Belgium; sexual refugees, who escaped to Belgium; and voluntary migrants, who chose to move to Belgium. Ethnic-cultural and sexual identifications interact and vary between these groups of participants, but also within them as they intersect with other social positionings such as class, gender and race.