The Features Of Diasporic Literature

From early times people have been moving from one area to another area across various places of the globe. The circumstances under which the people moved in search of better food, shelter, education, living standards and job opportunities. Sometimes people have been moved forcefully from their home land. The movement of people from one place to another has given birth to various things that are culture, the living standards, tradition and so on. People at all times have tried to make the remembrance of their existence through their writings.

Hence new kind of literature was formed called Diasporic Literature. The word diasporic means scattering. An origin of this word is basically from a Greek word. It can be defined as the works are created by people who were scattered once from their home land and shifted to another place. In this diasporic literature influenced world literature. Generally, it deals with loss of habitat, change of nativity, removal of identity, emergence of new set of traditions, replacement of the mother tongue and regeneration of mixed culture.

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It also addresses the rebirth of new culture from multiple cultures.

There are various situations which give birth to diasporic literature. Many of the diasporic writers want to create their own diasporic literature. Their ultimate aim is to conveying the sufferings and troubles which they have faced during their long journey that is from the land they have started and to the destination they have reached. They try to make their own identity through their writings for reestablish their cultural and linguistic behaviors which they have carried from their base land.

And also they tries to analyze the possibility of creating a new cultural identity by molding their existing or own migrated culture through dig out the existing cultures of the new land which they have arrived. Finally they newly create a community which has their own identity, culture, class, language, tradition and race. This group defines the recognition and existence of a new diasporic culture.

The process of relocation can be classified into two types. One can be called as permanent and the other can be a temporary relocation. Permanent relocation of people may give rise to new living styles and culture. The important point which one can notice in the process of a permanent relocation is that the moving or migrated family is relocated along with its roots to an entirely new area which often gives rise to new living style and culture. The migrated set of people can be of same family as well different family. The temporary relocation often may not give rise to any new culture or traditions. A person can get these experiences while going through a diasporic writing which helps the reader to understand the difficulties a family or a person faces during the process of relocation from one place to another.

The common ideologies or beliefs of two cultures give rise to new one. This newly formed culture can be an intersection of existing and migrated culture. Another kind culture can be the union or merging of all the existing cultures as well as the ones taken from the migrated culture. This leads to the formation of various kind of mixed culture with different mythological concepts. There can be situations like the land which they have arrived may be a home of various mythological beliefs, but still the probability of emergence of a new faith and tradition also cannot be ignored in such cases. Sometimes when the migrations of two families from the same place but with different religious background it gives rise to internal conflicts among themselves. These formations of two kinds of tradition or beliefs are very well depicted in most of the diasporic writings. There have been several scenarios for the reunion of different culture.

The Diasporic literature can be defined in terms of different generations. That is known as first and second generation. There has great difference between both generations. Usually, the first generation diaspora deals with the changes which have been reflected in the dressing style, food style of the migrated peoples. Changes are always a general tendency of normal human being. Acceptance of new food and dressing habits are the result of these changes. The people across various countries have always been a great difference in the food habits and dressing style. The climate and the geographic locations also play a vital role in creation of distinct food and dressing culture. The circumstances which have laid foundation for the establishment of new forms of food and clothes is very well narrated in the writings of various writers in the first generation diasporic era. It dates back to the period when the English, Dutch, Portuguese were a part of the Indian economy. We can also call these migrants as people who relocated to a country in temporary basis but they were still capable of insisting their cultures to the existing ones and reframe it.

The second generation diaspora does not focus on the food and clothing style of the scattered people. It mainly deals with the language, culture, tradition, race and so on. The terms ‘Nation’ and ‘Identity’ are very important words while we read the various dimensions of diaspora literature. When we think about the concept of nation and identity it becomes necessary to investigate the way of living life and human existence, in the past and present. The question of the nation and national identity was neither experienced nor imagined by mankind in prehistoric ages. The real problem of nation and identity emerges when such expatriate finds himself nowhere, even in the middle of the ocean of the human beings.