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Article Excerpt
Abstract
The following paper explores the idea of "refugee diasporas" by focusing on a case study of the Hindu Bengali exodus from East Pakistan (later Bangladesh) following the 1947 British Partition of India. The author begins by problematizing and historicizing definitions of diasporas in general and refugee diasporas in particular and then uses the case study to illustrate the diversity in experiences that different groups that emerged from the Partition encountered. This focus on the lived experiences of flight, resettlement, integration (or lack thereof), and the rebuilding of lives helps to unravel some of the embedded and obscured meanings that terms such as "refugee diaspora" might otherwise contain.
Resume
L'article explore la notion cle > qu'il illustre par l'exode d'hindous vers le Bengale depuis l'est du Pakistan (qui deviendra le Bangladesh), a la suite de la partition britannique des Indes de 1947. L'auteur commence par poser la problematique et l'historicite des definitions se rapportant aux diasporas en general et aux diasporas de refugies en particulier. Il se sert ensuite du cas cite pour mettre en lumiere la variete d'experiences auxquelles ont ete soumis les divers groupes issus de la partition. Cette focalisation sur des experiences vecues de deplacement, de reetablissement et d'integration (ou de leur absence), de meme que de reconstruction de vies permet de denouer quelques-unes des significations implicites ou moins evidentes que des expressions comme > pourraient autrement connoter.
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Diasporas have become increasing objects of study and attention in recent years. Diasporic communities may take many forms and engage in a substantial range of activities, yet "the diaspora" continues to resonate for scholars, social movements, and national governments (amongst others) as a locus for examining transnational practices, particularly in terms of global capital and political and cultural flows. What do diasporas and their activities tell us about identity, citizenship, community--indeed, what do they tell us about the nation-state itself? How are our notions of borders and boundaries disrupted by groups whose idea of a "homeland" does not fit easily onto a map or a census? This paper seeks to explore such questions by critically interrogating the idea of the "refugee diaspora." I begin by examining the construction of "diasporas" as a broad category of migration--forced and otherwise--throughout history. I look specifically at the tensions of nationality, identity, and the connection to place which are, in particular, markers of the "refugee diasporic" experience. I explore these issues by focusing on a specific historical event--the British Partition of India in 1947--and the diverse set of East Bengali refugee diasporas that emerge out of this period. This case highlights some of the complexities in identifying diasporic groups (including refugee diasporas) as unified or monolithic communities and instead shows some of the distinctions that class, caste, gender, ethnicity, and religion play in constructing their narratives, experiences, and imaginations. The final section of the paper looks at the legacies of the Partition and East Bengali refugees and the ongoing contestation over "home," as these are played out in within India and throughout the global Bengali diaspora.
Defining and Distinguishing Diasporas
Diasporic communities have existed for centuries and in many ways complicate modern notions of geographic and political boundaries. They are multi-faceted social organizations, interwoven in the contemporary context with legacies of colonialism and emerging trends towards cultural, economic, political, and social globalization. Diasporas take many forms beyond the traditional notion of persecuted victims forced to flee their homeland, though the enduring image of diasporic communities remains bound not to the notion of migration, but rather to that of forced displacement. It is the so-called "victim diasporas" (1) that dominate our view, such as Jewish groups persecuted across Europe through the centuries, Africans scattered by slavery over the Americas and the Caribbean, or, more recently, Armenians and Palestinians, displaced by genocide or deprived of a homeland.
But in recent years many other groups have increasingly been described by the category of diaspora. Alternative labels are often used synonymously--transmigrants, emigres, immigrants, and expatriates among them--though these terms describe sometimes very different forms of population movements. Regardless of the reasons for "leaving," it is nonetheless true that generations of communities have flourished away from their "original homelands," retaining strong economic and political ties to their places of origin and often a distinct cultural identity. Scholars have documented many such cases throughout history, and point to similar examples in the contemporary context. These include trading communities such as Lebanese, Chinese, Italian groups who migrated to distant shores, labourets (indentured or otherwise) from various parts of the Indian subcontinent who journeyed to Africa, the Caribbean, and Southeast Asia, and functionaries and soldiers from ancient Rome and colonial Britain, Russia, France and Belgium who spread throughout their empires. More recently, the postcolonial period has seen massive migration from former peripheries towards self-described cores--East and West Indians in Britain, North Africans and Southeast Asians in France, Central Asians in Russia, to name but a few. And indeed migrant labour across the world today represents one of the most significant flows of population in human history, from South Asians in the Persian Gulf to Latin Americans in the United States, and Eastern Europeans in Western Europe and many others besides. (2) The latter example does not simply mean seasonal workers who return to their "home" countries following the expiration of a contract or the harvest of a crop (though it might in some instances). Increasingly, whether arriving as legal or undocumented labour, such migrant workers have stayed on in host countries, settling in discrete, identifiable communities, and sending financial support to their families left behind. (3) It is indeed this dialectic, of connections to both a "new" and an "old" home simultaneously, that is characteristic of diasporas, no matter what their origin.
Given this wide range of definitions, however, one might well ask whether the category of diaspora continues to be a useful one to describe specific communities of refugees or whether it is too large and unwieldy as either a descriptive label or analytical framework. Some scholars disagree with including so many forms of population movement under the umbrella of diaspora and argue instead that only cases of forced migration should qualify. Others limit the term only to its capitalized use, that of the Jewish Diaspora, while yet others extend this narrower definition to include the descendents of African slaves and more contemporary victims of genocide rebuilding shattered lives elsewhere. (4) From such perspectives, the role of compulsion is central in identifying whether a community is diasporic or migrant in nature. Individuals and communities must have been forced to shift from one place to another in order to have been displaced. A further implicit connotation is that the actual compulsion itself is at the behest of a human agent. The motivations behind forced migration, in this view, are often part of a larger political strategy, tribal animus, or base self-interest.
But there are many problems with such a rigid reading of population movement, even of a forced nature. It is relatively straightforward to identify certain instances of forced migration--being kidnapped and sold into slavery, fleeing homes and livelihoods in the face of a violent and oppressive state or army or mob, for example. But there are many other and more subtle forms of pressure that have compelled population movements throughout history. The threat--rather than the actual experience--of violence has been a powerful motivator for flight. As well, one could argue that the economic motives which have driven many groups to relocate have themselves constituted a strongly coercive process--for example, Irish, southern Italian, and eastern European immigration to North America in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries or Indian travels to the Caribbean and Africa during the same period-though many of these migrants in strictly technical terms "chose" to leave their homes for a new life and were not forcibly transported as a result of conflict, slavery, or some other unwanted compulsion. Yet many cases such as those mentioned above arise as a result of specific economic policies and development initiatives of colonial powers and emerging nation-states.
Similarly important for some groups has...
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