Exile or Diaspora Studies?: On the Necessity of a Re-Evaluation of Exile

477 Ab Imperio, 3/2008 century? (As Benjamin Nathans demonstrated in his 2002 Beyond the Pale, Jews were prominent on campuses and court alike, but this topic is not discussed at any length here).2 And what of religious diversity in the modern era? Indeed, the authors are quiet about the relationships between the state and society in the recent decades. These reservations notwithstanding , Terra Universitatis does support its major claim that the university was a true community that survived attacks from outside and debates inside. Although the work is limited in its comparison to the schools and communities outside of Kazan State University, E.A. Vishlenkova, S. Iu. Malysheva, andA.A. Sal’nikova do show through analysis of the people, buildings, and culture on campus that the university, as a society dedicated to intellectual discussion, will continue to endure criticism from within and without. 2 Benjamin Nathans. Beyond the Pale: The Jewish Encounter with Late Imperial Russia. Berkeley, 2002. Anke HILBRENNER Exile or Diaspora studies? On the Necessity of a Re-Evaluation of Exile Journal of the Interdisciplinary Crossroads. April 2006. Vol. 3. No. 1 (Thematic Issue: David Kettler and Zvi Ben-Dor (Eds.), The Limits of Exile). 265 pp. ISSN: 0-972-9801. The “Journal of the Interdisciplinary Crossroads” has been published by the Allahabad Association for Historical and Cultural Studies (AAHCS) fromApril 2004 onwards. Despite its somewhat remote origin (remote at least from the perspective of an European based historian), it has managed to involve prominent scholars, such as Hayden White and Jörn Rüsen to name only two of them, in its publications. Moreover the journal has so far addressed interesting methodological topics connected to the so-called cultural turn, to critical theory and modern historiography. Unfortunately , the remoteness of the Journal limits its accessibility, but the special issue “The Limits of Exile” makes all contributions available online.1 The editors David Kettler and Zvi Ben-Dor outline the goal of (re-) mapping the “Limits of Exile” in a 1 For the journal’s web-site, see http://www. jic.in/contents.htm (Last time consulted August 1, 2008). 478 Рецензии/Reviews interaction with their second, third or final surroundings. They do not take concepts such as acculturation or assimilation for granted or distinguish between migrant on the one hand and the majority group on the other. To the contrary, they put individual experience, intellectual resources and transnational networks of the diaspora into perspective. As the diaspora came to be evaluated in increasingly positive terms, use of the concept expanded to include any migration or dispersion experience , which diluted the term’s usefulness. In this context the exile approach of Kettler and Ben-Dor fit into ongoing discussions of the concept. The editors of “Limits of Exile” are critical especially of the blurred significance of exile within the broader cultural approach of diaspora studies.According to them, it is especially the political dimension of exile that could vanish beyond the non-political analytical framework of diaspora. “Limits of Exile” thus aims at a re-introduction of the “political concept” of exile in its own right. Kettler and Ben-Dor remind us “that the first exile, the one that was translated as diaspora, was itself, at least in the way it was recorded, first and foremost a political event” (P. 4). Despite of this ambitious outline there is no common argument within the contributions. It is hardly a surprise that the article of the very intriguing introduction. While exile is a form of political punishment that was known already in ancient times, what Kettler, Ben-Dor and their contributors aim at is an analysis of modern exile prevalent in the twentieth century. One of the vital elements of this age of exile is the final triumph of the concept of the nation-state. The collapses of multi-national empires created new “homes” for some nations but also drove many into diaspora. The second pivotal cause of exile was the rise of modern “strong” states. Their strength was often enough converted into the “power to deny citizenship, expel, refuse entrance, and deny re-entrance and access to what was once one’s home” (P. 3). Kettler and Ben...