African Diaspora

2382 Words5 Pages

In simple terms, the Diaspora as a concept, describes groups of people

who currently live or reside outside the original homelands. We will

approach the Diaspora from the lenses of migration; that the migration

of people through out of the African continent has different points of

origin, different patterns and results in different identity

formations. Yet, all of these patterns of dispersion and germination/

assimilation represent formations of the Diaspora. My paper will focus

on the complexities of the question of whether or not Africans in the

Diaspora should return to Africa. This will be focused through the

lenses of the different phases in the Diaspora. The historical

Diaspora confirms pre-colonial global dispersion and resettlement of

Africans. These communities of relocated Africans identified and

maintained a connection with Africa, while still maintaining a

"Loyalty to their adopted country" and making valid and positive

contributions.

This brings us to a new question, what exactly then are the identities

of the African Diaspora and how was that identity forged under (in and

after) slavery? Avatar Brah best illuminates the journey of identity

formulation through the literature of the African Diaspora she wrote:

"Diasporic identities are at once local and global. They are networks

of the transnational identifications encompassing imagined and

encountered communities (Brah, 1994)." An individual can activate any

number of choices on the path to their identity, thus the context and

historical processes must be investigated.

The Diaspora originated from historical and cultural experiences of

the Jewish and Greek people, ...

... middle of paper ...

...s as a group

and to effective resistance to oppression. There's no need in

returning to Africa. "Despite Cesaire's construction of pre-colonial

Africa as an aggregation of warm, communal societies, he never calls

for a return. His concept of Negritude is future-oriented and modern.

His position in Discourse is unequivocal and sterile attempt to repeat

the past, but to get beyond. It is not a dead society that we want to

revive. We leave that to those who go in for exorcism…It is a new

society rich with all the productive power of modern times, warm with

all the fraternity of olden days."(Cesaire, 2000) James Aggrey said

many years ago that there is a new Africa coming today and it is a

challenge to civilization." Joseph Harris added that the new Africa

today is the world of African people, of Africa and its Diaspora.

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