Seeking one essay addressing diaspora and Native American culture
(broadly conceived), for a collection of essays entitled Transforming
Diaspora. We wish to receive queries/proposal from interested scholars
by November 15, 2006. The full CFP for the essay collection follows.
Send email submissions to robinfield_at_kings.edu.

Transforming Diaspora (Book Collection)

Eds. Parmita Kapadia and Robin Field

Cultural studies has generated a re-evaluation of the long established
tropes governing the diasporic condition. The emergence of various
diasporas prompts a rethinking of the field to include the experiences
of exiles, expatriots, refugees, migrants, tourists, as well as racial,
religious, ethnic, and linguistic "Others." The existence of the
diasporic state has been at the forefront of postcolonial scholarship
for over a decade now, but this scholarship has mainly focused on the
home/abroad binary. This collection of essays seeks to investigate the
growing impact of the diasporic condition in light of recent studies in
transnationalism, transculturalism, and globalization. How does the
existence of a diasporic community figure into the politics of the
nation-state? For longstanding diasporic communities, which place is
home and which is exile? How is the diasporic identity constructed,
particularly for later generations? How does the ascendancy of
globalization co-opt diasporic concerns?

Recent scholarship has only begun to explore the cultural impact of
these historically marginalized individuals and communities.
Diasporas-both established and emergent-are central and integral to
colonial, postcolonial, and transnational studies, especially critical
analyses of race, nationhood, modernity, identity, changes in economic
and social structures, and ethnic, religious, political, and linguistic
affiliation. Transforming Diaspora seeks to further our understanding
and application of theories of diaspora through sustained engagement
with the literature of diasporic communities. What cultural practices
challenge monolithic understandings of nationhood and instead gesture to
a transnational ethos? What are the effects of multiple cultural
inheritances on migrant populations? How does generational affiliation
affect the formation of cultural practices and notions of citizenship?
How are borders (of any sort) represented, critiqued, or exploded in
diaspora literature?

Building on the recent work by Arjun Appadurai, Paul Gilroy, Robin
Cohen, Stuart Hall, Homi Bhabha, and Vijay Prashad, this collection
seeks to redefine the composition, influence, and position of diasporas
and their contested relationships with dominant cultures and discourses.
We seek essays that are grounded in the literary and/or cultural texts
of any diasporic community, including South Asian, African, Jewish,
Latin American, Middle Eastern, etc. In discussing the ideas of culture,
citizenship, and transnationalism, these essays should offer
interpretations, extensions, and challenges to the current theoretical
understandings of diaspora(s). We welcome submissions from diverse
theoretical and critical approaches, particularly border cultures,
literary transnationalism, race, film studies, colonial and
postcolonialism.=20

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Received on Fri Nov 03 2006 - 18:06:56 EST