In This Issue

Diaspora 4:1 1995 In This Issue Winland rapidly surveys theoretical debates on the malleability of collective identity, then turns to the Croations of Canada. She shows that regional, sociological, and ideological differences created a highly heterogeneous ethnic community whose discourses and representations ofidentity have been transformed by the emergence of a Croat state after the collapse ofYugoslavia. Though many now reject their ethnic identity (as just another element of the pluralist and multicultural Canadian society) and opt for a national identity in a transnational setting, Winland shows that this emerging discourse of nationhood, which the Croat state seeks to influence, has not led to a homogenization of identities. Rai traces the constructions and contestations ofdiasporic Hindu identity on electronic bulletin boards by examining the transformation of what Gayatri C. Spivak has called "discourses of cultural specificity and difference." These were originally structured by legacies of colonialism and the national struggle against it, but have now been "packaged for transnational consumption." While describing their dissemination, Rai interrogates Nancy Fraser's version of the idea of a public sphere through Derrida's derealization of context ; he also outlines the positions within homeland discourse (religious and secular nationalisms) which are transposed into the Internet diaspora, where they are disseminated but where they may also be disrupted. Stevens briefly reviews sociobiological and rational choice theories of immigrant group behavior, then examines "inclusion" (interaction between members of ethnic and majority groups) rather than "integration" (which implies more harmony) of Khmers and SinoKhmers who were aged 15 to 19 when they arrived in Australia as refugees. She finds that despite the absence of official barriers to inclusion, racism and other problems at school, work, and neighborhood , combined with the ethnic groups' own anxieties, misconceptions , and resulting erection ofbarriers, keep inclusion low. Despite fluctuations in various indices of identity and differential rates of taking out citizenship, Australian national affiliation remains generally low. Baily examines three British Muslim diasporas of South Asian origin and maps their attitudes toward and uses of music. In one group, he finds that the rejection of music (possibly in the name of Diaspora 4:1 1995 religious orthodoxy) may play a role in the formation of identity. In another, intense caste and communal involvement in performing music professionally can shape identity even when the music performed is not specific to the diasporic community's culture. Finally, Baily finds that in the case of a third, Afghan diaspora, musical culture can reinforce nostalgic allegiance to a cultural identity whose home society was tragically destroyed. [Note: This article was originally meant to be included in the special "Music in Diaspora" section edited by Mark Slobin in Diaspora 3:3.] Mandel addresses Dominique Schnapper's overview ofimmigration policy in Western Europe, and juxtaposes its assumptions concerning the necessity and inevitability ofthe "national project" with a "multiculturalist" American approach to immigration, acculturation , integration, and assimilation. Mandel rejects the claim that the convergence in democratic European states of policies concerning immigrants is "inevitable." She also identifies and criticizes a widespread Western European assumption that a culture-free sphere of public policy toward immigrants both can and should exist. Greene praises and engages Gregory Jusdanis's study of literature as an ambivalent but powerful agent in the construction of Greek nationhood and modernity. He questions some of its assumptions about the relations of culture and national identity by juxtaposing the relations that obtained between them before and after Greece's struggle against the Ottoman form of colonialism (War of Independence launched in 1821) with Brazil's (declared independence from Portugal in 1822). Greene also challenges what he perceives to be Jusdanis's assignment to narrative—as against drama and lyric—of a privileged role in the construction of national identity . Finally, he explores the relations between the reader's subjectivity and public space by further considering the "communion between an individual and national consciousness" that Jusdanis sketches. ...