AphroChic Magazine: Issue No. 12

Reference
While Harris does not specifically
propose a “wheel model,” to describe the connection
between Diaspora cultures and the
African continent itself, it is presented here as
an accurate depiction of the relationship as it
is commonly imagined in many constructions
of the Diaspora, including Harris’. And though
this model is easily intuited and not without its
degree of accuracy, the proprietary sentiment
it conveys through such constructions as Africa
and its diaspora, are at the root of several
perspectives that construe the cultures and
peoples of the African Diaspora, not only as descendants
of the African continent but as derivatives
and ultimately possessions.
These suppositions, if not by themselves
openly problematic, at the very least raise
several important questions. Of the various
issues to consider in the proposition of "Africa
and its diaspora," three present themselves
as the most pressing: possession, construction
and position. The first of these, possession,
asks simply, to whom does the African
Diaspora belong?
The African Diaspora or Africa’s Diaspora?
No one contends the description, The
African Diaspora and no one should, because
that is what we are. However, there is a subtle
paternalism to the phrase Africa and its
diaspora, born, like the idea of the underlying
African self, of the belief that Africa somehow
holds within it an original culture, of which all
cultures of the external Diaspora are simple
derivatives.
By this logic we may, like all derivatives,
be judged and arranged in order of quality by
the extent to which we display an appropriate
resemblance to our source material — and
we have been, often by ourselves. Arguments
about which cultures are more or less
African have been all too common throughout
the years, fueling, among other things, the
important work of scholars such as Melville
Herskovits, Zora Neale Hurston, and W.E.B.
DuBois, among many others who investigated
connections between various New World
Diaspora and West African cultures in the early
20th century.
Beyond this important work, however,
the paternalistic streak to traditional definitions
of Diaspora has played out in a variety of
ways, most notably economically. For instance,
the definition offered by the African Union describing
the Diaspora as we of African origin
who, regardless of citizenship or nationality,
live outside the continent, goes on to stipulate
our willingness to, “contribute to the development
of the continent and the building of the
African Union,” as part of what qualifies us as
part of the Diaspora. Similarly, in 2010, when
Margaret Kilo, then head of Fragile States
Unit of the African Development Bank was interviewed
about the outcomes of a seminar
entitled, Mobilizing the African Diaspora for
Capacity Building and Development: Focus on
Fragile States, she defined the Diaspora as, “a
human and investment capital pool that can
strongly contribute to the continent’s development.”
Other organizations, such as the African
Diaspora Group, a non-profit focused on
strengthening financial ties between the
Diaspora and the Continent, roots the impetus
for a financial relationship in the cultural need
of those born away from the continent. Like
Harris, this group views the African Diaspora
as stateless, and without a common country of
origin, language, religion, or culture. “Mother
Africa,” The African Diaspora Group thereby
offers, “will help to restore what was lost, [vital
roots, history, and culture,] and the children of
the diaspora will reciprocate by providing the
knowledge and resources that were gained while
away.” Another section of the website suggests
that, “[it] is time for Africans in the diaspora to
break free from their manufactured identities,
and return to knowledge of self as an African.”
As these groups all seek to enact or at least
envision a particular future for the Diaspora, it
is worth interrogating the ways in which they
are constructing the idea, and how they mean
to employ it.
Like a Motherless Child
In each of the examples presented
above, a Triadic Model, similar if not identical
to Harris’ is being employed to envision the
Diaspora as a 3-part relationship between the
Continent, the (descendants of the) dispersed
and their countries of residence — with references
to both family and hierarchy as part of
the structure. The kind of parent-child relationship
these constructions envision between
Africa and the Diaspora makes a certain
amount of intuitive sense. However, “parent-child”
is a hierarchy, and any hierarchical
model of Diaspora must entail a concerning
sense of ethnocentrism while presenting a host
of other problems.
There is a lurking sense of eurocentrism
both in the way the The African Diaspora Group
offers to “restore what was lost,” for people of
the Diaspora — sometimes called “diasporans”
or “diasporeans,” — and its presentment of
“Mother Africa” as a monolithic whole. The first
upholds the European myth of Africa as ahistorical,
suggesting that African culture as it
exists today represents an original from which
Diaspora cultures are derived and to which
they can return. Yet many hundreds of years
have passed between the first dispersions and
where we all are today. “History,” as Stuart
Hall noted, “has intervened,” changing us from
what we were then to what we are now. While
there are many things that contemporary
Africa can offer the Diaspora and vice versa,
going back in time is not among them.
Further, Africa as we know is not a single
entity. It has many nations, languages and ethnicities,
and whether genetically or culturally,
many of us, as diasporeans, are made up of
quite a few of them. Therefore when presented
with the African Diaspora Group’s offer to shed
our, “manufactured identities,” (all identities
are manufactured) “and return to knowledge
of self as an African,” it would be fair of us to
ask, “what type of African should we return to
being? From what nations? Speaking which
languages?” We can further question whether
simply moving to Africa is enough to remake
us as Africans. Do we lose the distinction
of being born in another place and formed
in another culture as soon as we become
residents of an African state? And even if so, is
that something we want? Does the Diaspora,
African Americans, Caribbeans, et al. value its
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