Diaspora at Stake: From Diaspora as Essence to Diaspora as Method for African-American Literary and Cultural Studies

초록

Taking seriously the pros and cons of the diasporic frame of reference, my paper makes a critical inquiry into a possible scenario for the return of diaspora in the so-called post-racial era of America. My critical position assumes that African American studies are to be nested within broader currents of American history as well as in the larger economic, political and cultural dynamics that shape American life in general. Given this context, reexamining the critical usage of the concept of diaspora, I reassess the complex relationships between diaspora and transnationalism. In my scrutiny of the confrontation between the African American diaspora discourse and other transnationalist ones, I attempt to pave the way for a tenable interdisciplinary discursive site where African American criticism can intersect with other minority discourses. On this purpose, in order to save the African diaspora at stake, I suggest that diaspora as essence should be transformed to diaspora as method by throwing off the easy essentialist way of thinking.

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