After the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, millions of Romanians emigrated in search of work and new experiences; they became engaged in an interrogation of what it meant to be Romanian in a united Europe and the globalized world. Their thoughts, feelings and hopes soon began to populate the virtual world of digital and mobile technologies. This book chronicles the online cultural and political expressions of the Romanian diaspora using websites based in Europe and North America. Through online exchanges, Romanians perform new types of citizenship, articulated from the margins of the political field. The politicization of their diasporic condition is manifested through written and public protests against discriminatory work legislation, mobilization, lobbying, cultural promotion and setting up associations and political parties that are proof of the gradual institutionalization of informal communications. Online discourse analysis, supplemented by interviews with migrants, poets and politicians involved in the process of defining new diasporic identities, provide the basis of this book, which defines the new cultural and political practices of the Romanian diaspora.

The argument offered in this book is that new technology, as opposed to traditional media such as television, radio, and newspaper, is working against the national grain to weaken its imagined community. Online activities and communications between people and across borders suggest that digital media has strong implications for different articulations of identity and belongingness, which open new ways of thinking about the imagined community. The findings are based on transnational activities by Kurdish diaspora members across borders that have pushed them to rethink notions of belonging and identity. Through a multidisciplinary and comparative approach, and multifaceted (online-offline) methodologies, the book unveils tensions between new and old media, and how the former is not only changing social relations but also exposing existing ones. Living in two or more cultures, speaking multiple languages, and engaging in transnational practices, diaspora individuals may have created a momentum that discloses how the imagined nation is diminishing in this digital era.

A multidisciplinary, authoritative outline of the current intellectual landscape of the field. Over the past three decades, the term ‘diaspora’ has been featured in many research studies and in wider theoretical debates in areas such as communications, the humanities, social sciences, politics, and international relations. The Handbook of Diasporas, Media, and Culture explores new dimensions of human mobility and connectivity—presenting state-of-the-art research and key debates on the intersection of media, cultural, and diasporic studies This innovative and timely book helps readers to understand diasporic cultures and their impact on the globalized world. The Handbook presents contributions from internationally-recognized scholars and researchers to strengthen understanding of diasporas and diasporic cultures, diasporic media and cultural resources, and the various forms of diasporic organization, expression, production, distribution, and consumption. Divided into seven sections, this wide-ranging volume covers topics such as methodological challenges and innovations in diasporic research, the construction of diasporic identity, the politics of diasporic integration, the intersection of gender and generation with the diasporic condition, new technologies in media, and many others. A much-needed resource for anyone with interest diasporic studies, this book: Presents new and original theory, research, and essays Employs unique methodological and conceptual debates Offers contributions from a multidisciplinary team of scholars and researchers Explores new and emerging trends in the study of diasporas and media Applies a wide-ranging, international perspective to the subject Due to its international perspective, interdisciplinary approach, and wide range of authors from around the world, The Handbook of Diasporas, Media, and Culture is ideal for undergraduate and graduate students, teachers, lecturers, and researchers in areas that focus on the relationship of media and society, ethnic identity, race, class and gender, globalization and immigration, and other relevant fields.

Patrick Manning follows the multiple routes that brought Africans and people of African descent into contact with one another and with Europe, Asia, and the Americas. In joining these stories, he shows how the waters of the Atlantic Ocean, the Mediterranean Sea, and the Indian Ocean fueled dynamic interactions among black communities and cultures and how these patterns resembled those of a number of connected diasporas concurrently taking shaping across the globe. Manning begins in 1400 and traces the connections that enabled Africans to mutually identify and hold together as a global community. He tracks discourses on race, changes in economic circumstance, the evolving character of family life, and the growth of popular culture. He underscores the profound influence that the African diaspora had on world history and demonstrates the inextricable link between black migration and the rise of modernity. Inclusive and far-reaching, The African Diaspora proves that the advent of modernity cannot be fully understood without taking the African peoples and the African continent into account.

Diaspora & Hybridity deals with those theoretical issues which concern social theory and social change in the new millennium. The volume provides a refreshing, critical and illuminating analysis of concepts of diaspora and hybridity and their impact on multi-ethnic and multi-cultural societies’ - Dr Rohit Barot, Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Bristol What do we mean by 'diaspora' and 'hybridity'? Why are they pivotal concepts in contemporary debates on race, culture and society? This book is an exhaustive, politically inflected, assessment of the key debates on diaspora and hybridity. It relates the topics to contemporary social struggles and cultural contexts, providing the reader with a framework to evaluate and displace the key ideological arguments, theories and narratives deployed in culturalist academic circles today. The authors demonstrate how diaspora and hybridity serve as problematic tools, cutting across traditional boundaries of nations and groups, where trans-national spaces for a range of contested cultural, political and economic outcomes might arise. Wide ranging, richly illustrated and challenging, it will be of interest to students of cultural studies, sociology, ethnicity and nationalism.

A Companion to Diaspora and Transnationalism offers a ground-breaking combined discussion of the concepts of diaspora and transnationalism. Newly commissioned essays by leading scholars provide interdisciplinary perspectives that link together the concepts in new and important ways. A wide-ranging collection which reviews the most significant developments and provides valuable insights into current key debates in transnational and diaspora studies Contains newly commissioned essays by leading scholars, which will both influence the field, and stimulate further insight and discussion in the future Provides interdisciplinary perspectives on diaspora and transnationalism which link the two concepts in new and important ways Combines theoretical discussion with specific examples and case studies

Antonio Olliz Boyd is an emeritus professor of Latin American literature at Temple University. He holds a PhD from Stanford University, an MS from Grorgetown University, and a BA from Long Island University. Dr. Olliz Boyd has published various essays on Afro Latino aesthetics in literature in volumes, such as the Dictionary of Literary Biography: Modern Latin-American Fiction Writers; Singular Like a Bird: The Art of Nancy Morejon; Imagination, Emblems and Expressions: Essays on Latin American, Caribbean, and Continental Culture and Identity; Blacks in Hispanic Literature: Critical Essays among others, as well as articles on Afro Latino literary criticism in various refereed journals. --Book Jacket.