Demir publishes a new book chapter on 'Striking' Diasporas

Professor Ipek Demir (CERS) has published a new book chapter in an edited book with the Oxford University Press.

Demir, Ipek (2023) ‘Decolonizing Diaspora Studies: Accounting for the Transnational and Intersectional Interventions of “Striking” Diasporas’ in Immigrant Lives: Intersectionality, Transnationality, and Global Perspectives, edited by Edward Makwarimba and Edward Shizha, Oxford University Press.

Abstract:

This chapter makes a case for decolonizing the field of diaspora studies, a field which, despite the “diasporization of diaspora” (Brubaker, 2005, p. 4), has been trapped in methodologically nationalist perspectives which see diaspora as emerging out of ethno-political struggles within nation-states, often told from a perspective of push factors. This has brought limitations to understandings of diaspora. The chapter reveals and analyzes some of these limitations. Through two detailed case studies, namely the Bristol Bus Boycott and the Grunwick Dispute, it exposes the links between empires and diasporas, expands the transnational dimensions of diaspora, reveals the intersectional underpinnings of their struggles and thus shows how diasporas have intervened and decolonized the Global North.