The Newfoundland Diaspora: Mapping the Literature of Out-Migration

Out-migration, driven by high unemployment and a floundering economy, has been a defining aspect of Newfoundland society for well over a century, and it reached new heights with the cod moratorium in 1992. This Newfoundland “diaspora” has had a profound impact on the province’s literature.

Many writers and scholars have referred to Newfoundland out-migration as a diaspora, but few have examined the theoretical implications of applying this contested term to a predominantly inter-provincial movement of mainly white, economically motivated migrants. The Newfoundland Diaspora argues that “diaspora” helpfully references the painful displacement of a group whose members continue to identify with each other and with the “homeland.” It examines important literary works of the Newfoundland diaspora, including the poetry of E.J. Pratt, the drama of David French, the fiction of Donna Morrissey and Wayne Johnston, and the memoirs of David Macfarlane. These works are the sites of a broad inquiry into the theoretical flashpoints of affect, diasporic authenticity, nationalism, race, and ethnicity.

The literature of the Newfoundland diaspora both contributes to and responds to critical movements in Canadian literature and culture, querying the place of regional, national, and ethnic affiliations in a literature drawn along the borders of the nation-state. This diaspora plays a part in defining Canada even as it looks beyond the borders of Canada as a literary community.

1

Diaspora in the Newfoundland Context

Jennifer Delisle
Delisle draw on interdisciplinary theoretical work on diaspora to examine the implications and the value of applying this label to Newfoundland out-migration. She argues that the concept helpfully references the painful displacement of a group whose members continue to identify with each other and with the “homeland.”

Introduction
Mapping the Literature of Out-Migration
Jennifer Delisle

This chapter outlines the problem of Newfoundland out-migration and posits that much of Newfoundland’s literary production is a result of or response to this diaspora. A brief synopsis of each chapter is also given. 

2

Donna Morrissey and the Search for Prairie Gold

Jennifer Delisle

Donna Morrissey’s 2008 novel What They Wanted follows two young Newfoundlanders as they leave home to work in the oil patches of Alberta. Morrissey’s novel reveals the psychological and cultural damage done by economic instability and the destruction of the island’s resources, and shows that labour migrations can involve the diasporic feelings of choicelessness and victimization.

3
“The ‘Going Home Again’ Complaint”: Carl Leggo and Nostalgia for Newfoundland
Jennifer Delisle

The author analyzes the poetry of displaced poet Carl Leggo, arguing that for the diasporic individual, nostalgia can be a crucial tool for coping with the trauma of displacement and for constructing personal identities. She argues that affective responses reveal the dramatic role that leaving home plays in migrant Newfoundlanders’ lives.

4

E.J. Pratt and the Gateway to Canada

Jennifer Delisle

As the first literary figure of the Newfoundland diaspora, E.J. Pratt’s “authenticity” as a Newfoundlander has been the subject of much debate. Delisle analyzes receptions of Pratt’s work through the mid-twentieth century, suggesting that his role in the development of Canadian literary nationalism makes him a figure onto which a series of anxieties about diasporic, regional, and national identity are projected.

5

“A Papier Maché Rock”: Wayne Johnston and Rejecting Regionalism

Jennifer Delisle

For Wayne Johnston, diasporic distance enables the construction of what Salman Rushdie calls “imaginary homelands,” homelands remembered from away as places of the mind. The imaginary quality of the Newfoundland setting in Johnston’s novel The Colony of Unrequited Dreams challenges the very notion of authenticity and the restrictive cultural stereotypes imposed by conservative regionalist readings.

6

“This is Their Country Now”: David French, Confederation and the Imagined Community

Jennifer Delisle

Through an analysis of David French’s play 1949, I argue that the concept of a Newfoundland diaspora is tied to the legacy of Confederation. The play dramatizes the Confederation issue from a diasporic perspective, showing that the alienation that many displaced Newfoundlanders feel on the mainland reflects the larger alienation of the province within the federation.

7

Writing the “Old Lost Land”: Johnston Part 2

Jennifer Delisle

Diaspora and Confederation are often metaphorically intertwined; both involve the loss of the Newfoundland nation and the threat of Canadian assimilation. Johnston’s The Colony of Unrequited Dreams and his memoir Baltimore’s Mansion use the distance of diaspora to reconstruct the nation of Newfoundland as it “might have been” were it not for the ruptures of Confederation.

8

Buss/Clarke and the Negotiation of Identity

Jennifer Delisle

Drawing on Helen Buss/ Margaret Clarke’s Memoirs from Away: A New Found Land Girlhood, I explore the complex relationships between diaspora and race, and between Newfoundlanders and the concept of ethnicity. I argue that diaspora as a concept must be able to accommodate both the pain and marginalization of the Newfoundland migrant, and the relative advantage of Newfoundlanders compared to groups that do not benefit from the privileges and histories of whiteness.

9

The Second Generation: David Macfarlane

Jennifer Delisle

David Macfarlane, as the Ontario-born son of a Newfoundlander, shows in his family memoir The Danger Tree that the second generation can still be marked by a postmodern Newfoundland ethnicity. Macfarlane uses his liminal position to explore the vexed relationship between Newfoundland and the rest of Canada.

Conclusion

Writing in Diaspora Space

Jennifer Delisle

The author reflects on her own relationship to the Newfoundland diaspora to raise further implications for her research. Delisle suggests that applying Avtar Brah’s concept of “diaspora space” to Canada effectively references the current moment of transition in the institution of CanLit. The Newfoundland diaspora, then, is but one in a field of identifications reconfiguring “Canadianness.”