Contents
This article is currently available as a free download on Ingenta Connect
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Front matter
This article is currently available as a free download on Ingenta Connect
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Masthead
This article is currently available as a free download on Ingenta Connect
Quelle: http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/gws/gws/2016/00000013/00000001/art00001
‘Journey to the future’: imaginaries and motivations for homeland trips among diasporic Armenians
Abstract
This article highlights diasporic migrants' transnational linkages with and trips to their homeland. Second and later generations of diasporic Armenians, predominantly from the USA and Canada, claim to travel to the ancestral homeland in Armenia not as heritage tourists to see the holy Mount Ararat but to invest in local development through social work. Based on ethnographic research, in-depth interviews with volunteers and text materials, this article identifies those specific features of the contemporary diasporic ‘sacred journey’ that differ from conventional return migrations. This new inter-continental migratory path between North America and Armenia has a temporary character. By analysing the range of reasons why young professional Armenian-Americans and Armenian-Canadians should choose to travel the long distance to offer their services, this article provides insight into the decision to become a volunteer in Armenia and the ways non-profit diasporic organizations channel and mobilize this transnational activity. The study shows that ‘ethnic’ volunteers are highly conscious of the modern understanding of mobility as being a marker of personal social status within the society in which they grew up. The study of a variety of imaginaries among members of a paradigmatic diasporic group, such as Armenians, shows how second and later diasporic generations take advantage of their multi-cultural background to become transnational global actors.
Quelle: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi?DOI=10.1111%2Fglob.12149
The demobilization of diaspora: history, memory and ‘latent identity’
Abstract
In the context of sustained interest in the mobilization of diasporic identities, I consider how and why diasporic identities might be demobilized over time. I use the case of an Indian Pakistani community in the UK and the USA (sometimes referred to as ‘Bihari’) to examine how historical memories of conflict are narrated in diaspora and the impact this has on the presence or absence of ‘diasporic consciousness'. The significance of memory in diasporic and transnational communities has been neglected, especially where the narration of historical events is concerned. The impact of forgetting has received particularly scant attention. I argue that, in the absence of this story, important lessons about the role of history in the formation of community are obscured. In this example, the ‘latent’ identities created on diaspora's demobilization help us to unpick the dyadic relations of ‘home’ and ‘away’ at the heart of essentialist conceptualizations of the concept.
Quelle: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi?DOI=10.1111%2Fglob.12150
The digitization of diaspora engagement: managing extraterritorial talent using the internet
Abstract
In this article, I examine how the government of the People's Republic of China (PRC) seeks to manage its skilled emigrants in the information age; I investigate the rationales, techniques and imageries underlying the use of the internet by the state. For the research, I used interviews, participant observation and documentary analysis to explore the case of London-based Chinese professionals and their contacts with the PRC government. The findings demonstrate that two modes of internet use mainly manage these skilled emigrants. First, digitized diasporic associations play a key role in brokering the influences of the government among the diaspora. Second, the PRC government has set up websites to collect and manage information on skilled emigrants pertaining to their labour market potential. A nationalistic discourse of a caring and protective state of origin surround both governing practices. Nevertheless, some emigrants resist these internet-mediated governing practices, through distrust and a calculated rationality underscored by a neoliberal logic.
Quelle: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi?DOI=10.1111%2Fglob.12151