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[Meghan Beas]

A diaspora (/daɪˈspərə/ dy-ASP-ər-ə) is a population that is scattered across regions which are separate from its geographic place of origin.[3][4] The word is used in reference to people who identify with a specific geographic location, but currently reside elsewhere.[5][6][7]

According to a 2019 United Nations report, the Indian diaspora is the world's largest diaspora, with a population of 17.5 million, followed by the Mexican diaspora, with a population of 11.8 million, and the Chinese diaspora, with a population of 10.7 million.[25]

There is confusion over the exact process of derivation from these Ancient Greek verbs to the concept of diaspora. Many cite Thucydides (5th century BC) as the first to use the word.[27][28][29] However, sociologist Stphane Dufoix remarks "not only is the noun diaspora quite absent from the Greek original [Thucydides' Peloponnesian War, II, 27)], but the original does not include the verb diasper either. The verb used is the verb sper (seed) conjugated in the passive aorist."[30] The passage in Thucydides reads:

Dufoix further notes, "Of all the occurrences of diaspora in the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae (TLG), which draws upon almost the entire written corpus in the Greek language . . . none refer to colonisation."[32] Dufoix surmises that the confusion may stem from a comment by Jewish historian Simon Dubnow, who wrote an entry on diaspora for the influential Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences.[33] His entry, published in 1931, includes the following remark: "In a sense Magna Graecia constituted a Greek diaspora in the ancient Roman Empire."[34][a] "Magna Graecia" refers to ancient Greek colonies established along the Italian coast, which lost their independence following the Second Punic War and their integration into the Roman Empire.

When the Bible was translated into Greek, the word diaspora was applied in reference to the Kingdom of Samaria which was exiled from Israel by the Assyrians between 740 and 722 BC,[36] as well as Jews, Benjaminites, and Levites who were exiled from the Kingdom of Judah by the Babylonians in 587 BC, and Jews who were exiled from Roman Judea by the Roman Empire in 70 AD.[37] It subsequently came to be used in reference to the historical movements and settlement patterns of the Jews.[38] In English, capitalized, and without modifiers, the term can refer specifically to the Jewish diaspora.[39] The wider application of diaspora evolved from the Assyrian two-way mass deportation policy of conquered populations to deny future territorial claims on their part.[40]

This scattering abrode of the Iewes, as it were an heauenly sowing, fell out after their returne from the captiuitie of Babylon. Wherevpon both Acts. 2. and also 1. Pet. 1. and 1. Iam. ver. 1. [sic] they are called Diaspora, that is, a scattering or sowing abrode.[41]

However, the current entry on "diaspora" in the Oxford English Dictionary Online dates the first recorded use a century later to 1694, in a work on ordination by the Welsh theologian James Owen. Owen wanted to prove that there is no difference in the Bible between Presbyters and Bishops; he cited the example of the Jews in exile:

The term became more widely assimilated into English by the mid 1950s, with long-term expatriates in significant numbers from other particular countries or regions also being referred to as a diaspora.[44] An academic field, diaspora studies, has become established relating to this sense of the word.

William Safran in an article published in 1991,[45] set out six rules to distinguish diasporas from migrant communities. These included criteria that the group maintains a myth or collective memory of their homeland; they regard their ancestral homeland as their true home, to which they will eventually return; being committed to the restoration or maintenance of that homeland, and they relate "personally or vicariously" to the homeland to a point where it shapes their identity.[46][47][48] Safran's definitions were influenced by the idea of the Jewish diaspora.[49] Safran also included a criterion of having been forced into exile by political or economic factors, followed by a long period of settlement in the new host culture.[50] In 1997, Robin Cohen argued that a diasporic group could leave its homeland voluntarily, and assimilate deeply into host cultures.[51]

Rogers Brubaker (2005) more inclusively applied three basic definitional criteria: First, geographic dispersion (voluntary or forced) of a people; second, "the orientation to a real or imagined 'homeland' as an authoritative source of value, identity and loyalty"; and third, maintenance of a social boundary corresponding to the conservation of a distinctive diasporic identity which differs from the host culture.[52] Brubaker also noted that the use of the term diaspora has been widening. He suggests that one element of this expansion in use "involves the application of the term diaspora to an ever-broadening set of cases: essentially to any and every nameable population category that is to some extent dispersed in space".[53] Brubaker used the WorldCat database to show that 17 out of the 18 books on diaspora published between 1900 and 1910 were on the Jewish diaspora. The majority of works in the 1960s were also about the Jewish diaspora, but in 2002 only two out of 20 books sampled (out of a total of 253) were about the Jewish case, with a total of eight different diasporas covered.[54]

Most early discussions of the diaspora were firmly rooted in a conceptual 'homeland'; they were concerned with a paradigmatic case, or a small number of core cases. The paradigmatic case was, of course, the Jewish diaspora; some dictionary definitions of diaspora, until recently, did not simply illustrate but defined the word with reference to that case.

Some observers have labeled evacuation from New Orleans and the Gulf Coast in the wake of Hurricane Katrina the New Orleans diaspora, since a significant number of evacuees have not been able to return, yet maintain aspirations to do so.[56][57] Agnieszka Weinar (2010) notes the widening use of the term, arguing that recently, "a growing body of literature succeeded in reformulating the definition, framing diaspora as almost any population on the move and no longer referring to the specific context of their existence".[47] It has even been noted that as charismatic Christianity becomes increasingly globalized, many Christians conceive of themselves as a diaspora, and form a bond that mimics salient features of some ethnic diasporas.[58]

Professional communities of individuals no longer in their homeland can also be considered diaspora. For example, science diasporas are communities of scientists who conduct their research away from their homeland[59] and trading diasporas are communities of merchant aliens. In an article published in 1996, Khachig Tllyan[60] argues that the media have used the term corporate diaspora in a rather arbitrary and inaccurate fashion, for example as applied to "mid-level, mid-career executives who have been forced to find new places at a time of corporate upheaval" (10) The use of corporate diaspora reflects the increasing popularity of the diaspora notion to describe a wide range of phenomena related to contemporary migration, displacement and transnational mobility. While corporate diaspora seems to avoid or contradict connotations of violence, coercion, and unnatural uprooting historically associated with the notion of diaspora, its scholarly use may heuristically describe the ways in which corporations function alongside diasporas. In this way, corporate diaspora might foreground the racial histories of diasporic formations without losing sight of the cultural logic of late capitalism in which corporations orchestrate the transnational circulation of people, images, ideologies and capital.

In contemporary times, scholars have classified the different kinds of diasporas based on their causes, such as colonialism, trade/labour migrations, or the social coherence which exists within the diaspora communities and their ties to the ancestral lands. Some diaspora communities maintain strong cultural and political ties to their homelands. Other qualities that may be typical of many diasporas are thoughts of return to the ancestral lands, maintaining any form of ties with the region of origin as well as relationships with other communities in the diaspora, and lack of full integration into the new host countries. Diasporas often maintain ties to the country of their historical affiliation and usually influence their current host country's policies towards their homeland. "Diaspora management" is a term that Harris Mylonas has "re-conceptualized to describe both the policies that states follow in order to build links with their diaspora abroad and the policies designed to help with the incorporation and integration of diasporic communities when they 'return' home".[61]

The diaspora of Africans during the Atlantic slave trade is one of the most notorious modern diasporas. 10.7 million people from West Africa survived transportation to arrive in the Americas as slaves starting in the late 16th century CE and continuing into the 19th.[62] Outside of the Atlantic slave trade, however, African diasporic communities have existed for millennia. While some communities were slave-based, other groups emigrated for various reasons.

From the 8th through the 19th centuries, the Arab slave trade dispersed millions of Africans to Asia and the islands of the Indian Ocean.[63][page needed] The Islamic slave trade also has resulted in the creation of communities of African descent in India, most notably the Siddi, Makrani and Sri Lanka Kaffirs.[64][page needed]

Beginning as early as the 2nd century AD, the kingdom of Aksum (modern-day Ethiopia) created colonies on the Arabian Peninsula. During the 4th century, Aksum formally adopted Christianity as a state religion, becoming the first to do so along with Armenia. In the 6th century, Kaleb of Axum invaded Himyar (modern-day Yemen) to aid and defend Christians under religious persecution. During these campaigns, several groups of soldiers chose not to return to Aksum. These groups are estimated to have ranged in size from the 600s to mid 3000s.[65]

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