ABSTRACT
The past few decades have witnessed a surge of interest in return migration studies. However, the focus has mainly been on short-term return mobilities and/or on the first-, and more recently, second-generation migrants. Long-term diasporic return migration, the subject of this chapter, has remained relatively understudied and undertheorized. After situating this topic within the broad literature on migration and diasporas, I present some distinctive features of long-term diasporic return migration. I propose a conceptual framework inspired by social theory for the examination of diasporic return motivations and experiences. The chapter is based on my research on the immigration to and long-term settlement in post-Soviet Armenia of Armenians from well-established diasporic communities – mostly from Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Canada and the USA (Karageozian 2015b).
