International Affairs and Global Strategy www.iiste.org ISSN 2224-574X (Paper) ISSN 2224-8951 (Online) Vol.46, 2016 10 Defining Diaspora and Their Online Engagements: Problematic Constructions, Deconstructions Abiodun Adeniyi, Ph.D. Senior Lecturer, Department of Mass Communication, Baze University, Abuja 1.1: ABSTRACT The meanings of some key concepts are experiencing stimulating and “even polemical debates” (Özkirimlii, 2000). Key amongst these concepts is diaspora. A few definitions of the concepts challenge essentialist and normative approaches. Some examples are those of Cohen (1997) on diaspora; Giddens (1991), Gilroy (1993), Hall (1996), and Ang (2000) on identity; Anderson (1983), Gellner (1983), Smith (1994) on nationalism; Glick Schiller, et al (1992), Portes (1996, 1997), Robins and Aksoy (2003, 2005) on transnationalism; and Brah (1996), Naficy (1999), Connor (2001), and Hammer (2007) on home and the homeland. Some other works situate definitions within an otherwise restrictive analytical framework. Examples of these are Safran (1991), Marienstras (1999) on diasporas; Kedourie, (1960), Deutsch (1969), Nairn, (1997), on nationalism; and Rapport and Dawson, (1998) on home and the homeland. This paper discusses the concepts based on “how they should be theorised”, rather than “what they are”. This is because of emerging new meanings in a world of constant global changes, such that the productions and reproductions of meanings require regular reviews. 1.2: INTRODUCTION Beginning with the problematic concept of diaspora, I shall discuss its past and present framework as has been done by seminal theorists. The paper shall then examine the definitions of the concept in ideal types by Safran (1991), Cohen (1997) and Marienstras (1999. I will explain along with them the theories of those who are partly anti-essentialists, partly anti-normative through their opposition to the development of ideal types. For a better structuring of arguments on nationalism, the focus will be on the post-1980 theorists (Zuelow, 2006). 1.3: METHODOLOGY Qualitative analysis was used for this research. It was founded on a critical evaluation of secondary data that included literature on how diaspora is to be theorized, literature on the history of notable diaporas and literature on their online engagements, besides literatures that sought to gauge the disparate viewpoints on the subject matters of displacements, and the related elements of existence in dislocation. The reviewed literature were spread over time, deep into the history of diasporas, and up until the coming of new communication facilities that sought the pains of communication. 2.1: THEORIES OF DIASPORA The concept of diaspora has a long history. Its interdisciplinary as related to sociology, political science, cultural studies, geography, anthropology, history, philosophy, literature, communication, religion, cinema, music, theatre, (Vertovec, 2000:2; Karim, 2003:1; Brubaker, 2005:4), qualifies it as one of the few terms helpful to theorising human mobility in present times. Originally Greek, diaspora in its recent definition compares with other socio- cultural and economic terms like globalisation, transnationalism, identity, nationalism, nations and nations-state, amongst other expressions that define global changes. The concept became more popular since the 1980s (Cunningham and Sinclair, 2001:9), into the 1990s, when global economies began witnessing a boom, with increase in human mobility. Issues around movement and settlement often lead to discourses on diaspora. It also involves notions on “travelling and dwelling” (Morley, 2000). Besides, displacements across borders, dislocations and relocations, integrations and disintegrations, “outsiders” and “insiders”, sameness and difference (Gilroy, 1993, 2000; Hall, 1996), frequently relate to the concept. Diaspora is also used to address issues like cosmopolitanism and multiculturalism (Georgiou, 2006c); nation and nationalism (Anderson, 1998); transnationalism and migration (Cohen, 1997; Vertovec and Cohen, 1999; Vertovec, 2004, 2005). Other than these are ideas on “strangeness”, and identity (Gilroy, 1997; Georgiou, 2006a), while “notions of ethnicity, immigration, settlement and race are all found to intersect and dissect conceptualisation of diaspora” (Kalra, et al, 2005: 9), just as it “shares an overlapping semantic field (Tololyan, 1991, 1996)”, with these subject matters (Brubaker, 2005:10). Diaspora is additionally a culturalist approach to the contextualisation of resettlement amongst a people, as it emphasises boundedness, (amongst themselves) and possible integration (in hostland), as against individualism (Robins and Aksoy, 2003). The concept refers to the sowing or the scattering of seeds in Greek. It implies forceful dispersal of people from an original location, or the homeland, to different other places, or nations, when it is about humans. A people who voluntarily live in a place outside an original home, with strong collective identity can be a diaspora (Cohen,