Diaspora
Volume
4, Number 1, Spring 1995
Articles:
"We
Are Now an Actual Nation": The Impact of National Independence
on the Croatian Diaspora in Canada
Daphne N. Winland
Winland
rapidly surveys theoretical debates on the malleability of collective
identity, then turns to the Croatians of Canada.
She
shows that regional, sociological, and ideological differences created
a highly heterogeneous ethnic community whose discourses and representations
of identity have been transformed by the emergence of a Croat state
after the collapse of Yugoslavia. Though many now reject their ethnic
identity (as just another element of the pluralist and multicultural
Canadian society) and opt for a national identity in a transnational
setting, Winland shows that this emerging discourse of nationhood,
which the Croat state seeks to influence, has not led to a homogenization
of identities.
India
On-line: Electronic Bulletin Boards and the Construction of a Diasporic
Hindu Identity
Amit S. Rai
Rai
traces the constructions and contestations of diasporic Hindu identity
on electronic bulletin boards by examining the transformation of what
Gayatri C. Spivak has called "discourses of cultural specificity
and difference." These were originally structured by legacies
of colonialism and the national struggle against it, but have now
been "packaged for transnational consumption." While describing
their dissemination, Rai interrogates Nancy Fraser's version of the
idea of a public sphere through Derrida's delocalization of context;
he also outlines the positions within homeland discourse (religious
and secular nationalisms) which are transposed into the Internet diaspora,
where they are disseminated but where they may also be disrupted.
The
Illusion of Social Inclusion: Cambodian Youth in South Australia
Christine A. Stevens
Stevens
briefly reviews sociobiological and rational choice theories of immigrant
group behavior, then examines "inclusion" (interaction between
members of ethnic and majority groups) rather than "integration"
(which implies more harmony) of Khmers and Sino-Khmers who were aged
15 to 19 when they arrived in Australia as refugees. She finds that
despite the absence of official barriers to inclusion, racism and
other problems at school, work, and neighborhood, combined with the
ethnic groups' own anxieties, misconceptions, and resulting erection
of barriers, keep inclusion low. Despite fluctuations in various indices
of identity and differential rates of taking out citizenship, Australian
national affiliation remains generally low.
The
Role of Music in Three British Muslim Communities
John Baily
Baily
examines three British Muslim diasporas of South Asian origin and
maps their attitudes toward and uses of music. In one group, he finds
that the rejection of music (possibly in the name of religious orthodoxy)
may play a role in the formation of identity. In another, intense
caste and communal involvement in performing music professionally
can shape identity even when the music performed is not specific to
the diasporic community's culture. Finally, Baily finds that in the
case of a third, Afghan diaspora, musical culture can reinforce nostalgic
allegiance to a cultural identity whose home society was tragically
destroyed.
One
Nation Indivisible: Contemporary Western European Immigration Policies
and the Politics of Multiculturalism.
Maud S. Mandel
Mandel
addresses Dominique Schnapper's overview of immigration policy in
Western Europe, and juxtaposes its assumptions concerning the necessity
and inevitability of the "national project" with a "multiculturalist"
American approach to immigration, acculturation, integration, and
assimilation. Mandel rejects the claim that the convergence in democratic
European states of policies concerning immigrants is "inevitable."
She also identifies and criticizes a widespread Western European assumption
that a culture-free sphere of public policy toward immigrants both
can and should exist.
Nation-Building
by Anthology
Roland Greene
Greene
praises and engages Gregory Jusdanis's study of literature as an ambivalent
but powerful agent in the construction of Greek nationhood and modernity.
He questions some of its assumptions about the relations of culture
and national identity by juxtaposing the relations that obtained between
them before and after Greece's struggle against the Ottoman form of
colonialism (War of Independence launched in 1821) with Brazil's (declared
independence from Portugal in 1822). Greene also challenges what he
perceives to be Jusdanis's assignment to narrative-as against drama
and lyric-of a privileged role in the construction of national identity.
Finally, he explores the relations between the reader's subjectivity
and public space by further considering the "communion between
an individual and national consciousness" that Jusdanis sketches.
