The African Diaspora in Canada: Negotiating Identity and Belonging

University of Calgary PRISM: University of Calgary's Digital Repository University of Calgary Press University of Calgary Press Open Access Books 2005 The African diaspora in Canada: negotiating identity and belonging University of Calgary Press The African diaspora in Canada: negotiating identity and belonging / edited by Wisdom J. Tettey & Korbla P. Puplampu. Series: Africa, missing voices series 2, University of Calgary Press, Calgary, Alberta, 2005. http://hdl.handle.net/1880/48644 book http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives 3.0 Unported Downloaded from PRISM: https://prism.ucalgary.ca University of Calgary Press www.uofcpress.com THE AFRICAN DIASPORA IN CANADA: NEGOTIATING IDENTITY & BELONGING Edited by Wisdom J. Tettey & Korbla P. Puplampu ISBN 978-1-55238-563-0 THIS BOOK IS AN OPEN ACCESS E-BOOK. 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Acknowledgement: We acknowledge the wording around open access used by Australian publisher, re.press, and thank them for giving us permission to adapt their wording to our policy http://www.re-press.org/content/view/17/33/ SECTION IV � Place, ‘In-Between’ Spaces, & the Negotiation of Identities � African_Book.indb 147 12/17/05 1:45:14 PM African_Book.indb 148 12/17/05 1:45:14 PM 8 BORDER CROSSINGS & HOME–DIASPORA LINKAGES AMONG AFRICAN–CANADIANS: An Analysis of Translocational Positionality, Cultural Remittance, & Social Capital Wisdom J. Tettey and Korbla P. Puplampu INTRODUCTION ignificant socio-economic developments in this era of globalization and internal po- litical strife have pushed many people out Sof their countries of origin to explore possibili- ties for survival in other places. Concomitant with these transnational movements are innovations in the field of technology that attenuate the barriers posed by time and space – what Giddens (1985) calls time-space distanciation. As a result of these processes, some observers contend that there is no longer the need to draw a distinction between temporary and permanent migration. In advanc- ing this view, Richmond (2002, 713) opines that “globalization has facilitated worldwide network linkages with friends and families in the former country, and with the international labour mar- ket.” Consequently, transilience, which he defines as the ability to move back and forth between two or more countries and cultures, has become a fact of life. A corollary to these processes of shifting lo- cations and attachments is the reconfiguration of 149 African_Book.indb 149 12/17/05 1:45:14 PM people’s identities in ways that are anti-essentialist and that transcend fixed notions of self, location, culture, ethnicity, and citizenship. These understandings of the ethos of people in motion have been at the basis of the concept of hybridity. A key contribution of this concept has been to pursue analyses that help to “overcome the victimology of transnational migrants, empowering them, linking the past with the present” (Anthias 2001, 620). To capture the multiple complexities that characterize immigrants’ in-between status (Bhaba 1998) and to give the concept of hybridity a more encompassing essence vis-à-vis issues of belonging, otherness, and identity, it is important that we explore other dimensions of immigrants’ experiences. To advance this purpose, Anthias (2001) proposes the idea of translocational positionality that allows us to interrogate other constructions of difference (beyond culture) based on various identifiers and signifiers. Such a tool makes it possible to look beyond immigrant communities as homogenous groups bound together by a collective identity in relation to others. It opens up ana- lytical insights into different narratives of belonging and otherness, not only in the context of the host society, but of the societies of origin, as well. As Anthias (2001, 633) argues, [c]ollective identities involve forms of social organization postulating boundaries with identity markers that denote essential elements of mem- bership (which act to code people), as well as claims that are articulated for specific purposes. The identity markers (culture, origin, language, colour, and physiognomy, etc.) may themselves function as resources that are deployed contextually and situationally. They function both as sets of self- attributions and attributions by others. By focusing on location/dislocation and on positionality, it is possible to pay attention to spatial and contextual dimensions, treating the issues involved in terms of processes rather than possessive properties of individuals. (see also Dirlik 1999) In the following discussion, we use the framework of translocational positionality to analyze the multiple ways in which first generation African-Canadians connect with their communities/countries of origin in spite of the spatial distanciation that their location in Canada imposes. The rationale behind using this framework stems from the fact that it allows us to escape the constraints of a binary division between subjectivity, on the one hand, and cultural de- terminism, on the other. Rather, what we have is a dialectical approach that facilitates the appreciation of the multiple, simultaneous, fluid, and sometimes conflictual, positions occupied by individuals and groups as they negotiate their sense of self and consequent attachments to cultures, ethnicities, places, and nations. We must acknowledge at the outset that connections to home and our per- ceptions of it also reflect different experiences, interests, and rationales. As 150 Border Crossings & Home–Diaspora Linkages among African–Canadians African_Book.indb 150 12/17/05 1:45:15 PM Shami (1998, 633) observes, “even with the formation of collective approaches to the homeland, people who journey back and forth, their motivations, aims, representations, and the kinds of landscapes they construct as they travel these circuits vary significantly.” It is in this respect that Shain and Barth’s (2003) distinction among core, passive, and silent members of the diaspora is useful to keep in mind as we discuss the relationships between African-Canadians and their home countries, especially within the public sphere. While core members are at the forefront of articulating their connections to the homeland and mobilizing their compatriots, passive members tend to be on the margins but are ready to make themselves available for purposes initiated by the core. Silent members are generally not involved in diaspora affairs, but they may respond to the needs of their communities of origin in times of crisis, whether in Canada or at home. Related to these distinctions is how individuals and groups define home. The extent of one’s involvement in both a geographical and deterritorialized home is partly determined by his/her definition of the term. Home, in the context of this chapter, is where one best knows oneself – where best means most even not always happiest. Here, in sum, is an ambiguous and fluid but yet ubiquitous no- tion, apposite for charting the ambiguities and fluidities, the migrancies and paradoxes, of identity in the world today ... [B]eing at home and being homeless are not matters of movement, of physical space, or of the fluid- ity of socio-cultural times and places, as such. One is at home when one inhabits a cognitive environment in which one can undertake the routines of daily life and through which one finds one’s identity best mediated – and homeless when such a cognitive environment is eschewed. (Rapport and Dawson 1998, 9–10) As they construct and interpellate a sense of belonging, home, location, and dislocation, the experiences of African-Canadians are based on a concept of place that traverses the physical boundaries of a particular state, though it in- corporates it.

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