ABSTRACT
Early discussions of diaspora emphasize forced and traumatic dispersion, homeland orientation, and strict boundary maintenance as constitutive elements (Brubaker 2005; Bruneau 2010; Cohen 1997; Safran 1991; Tölölyan 1996). Involvement in homeland politics among those coercively displaced does not appear unusual; rather, it is expected since they regard their ancestral homeland as their true and ideal home, to which they or their descendants would eventually return when conditions are suitable. This is because, according to Tölölyan (1996: 13), ‘diasporas are displaced but homogeneous and established “ethnies” that, while still in their homeland, were already endowed with protonational social and cultural characteristics’.
