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AN ANTHROPOLOGICAL APPROACH TO DIASPORA MISSIOLOGY
Dr. Steven Ybarrola
Professor of Cultural Anthropology
Asbury Theological Seminary
In 1898 my grandfather, Martín Ibarrola, left his small village located in the Pyrenees
mountains north of Pamplona and migrated to the United States. Like so many immigrants
before and after him, Martín entered the United States through Ellis Island, but soon thereafter
made his way across the country to California. After working several years for others, he
eventually settled in the north-central part of Montana where, like many other Basques, he set up
and ran a sheep ranch. In his early 40s he met and married Mary Kiwimagi (by then the name
had been shortened to Kiwi), whose family had their own story of migration from Estonia to the
Crimea, and eventually to North America.
From this seemingly simple and rather common story of migration to the United States
there arise a number of questions that have been the focus of research by anthropologists. For
example, why did Martín emigrate in the first place (i.e., what were the sociocultural factors that
affected his choice to leave his natal village)? Why did he come to the United States (i.e., what
were the factors that led him specifically to the U.S.)? What were the conditions like in the host
country when he arrived (i.e., how were immigrants viewed by the broader society at that time)?
Why did he travel to California after arriving (i.e., was there a Basque community that he
became a part of)? Why did he get involved in the sheep industry (i.e., was there an economic
niche that Basques typically filled)? Why did he end up marrying an Estonian rather than a
Basque woman (i.e., what were the sociocultural conditions that would lead to, or allow, this
type of intermarriage)? How did the experiences of subsequent generations of his family differ
from his own (i.e., to what degree did they integrate or assimilate into the broader American
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society)? To what extent did he maintain contact with his family back in the Basque village (i.e.,
to what degree were there transnational ties)?
What the foregoing illustrates is that issues related to immigration have been, and
continue to be, the focus of much anthropological research and theorizing. In this paper I will
briefly trace the history of anthropology’s focus on immigration and migrant communities,
leading up to its current interest in migrant diasporas and transnationalism. I will then discuss a
few ways in which anthropology can assist us in researching and better understanding different
aspects of diaspora missiology. Finally, I will argue that diaspora missiology opens up a new
possibility of cooperation between anthropology and missiology, thereby lessening the historic
gap and animosity between the two disciplines.
ANTHROPOLOGY AND THE STUDY OF IMMIGRANT POPULATIONS
Franz Boas, the “father” of American anthropology, was himself a German Jewish
immigrant to the United States, which no doubt contributed to his research interest in the issue of
“race” with regard to recent immigrants to the U.S. Although Boas’ migration to the States
predated the overt racism of Germany’s Third Reich and its policy of Jewish extermination (he
took his first teaching position in the States in 1888), the context he arrived in his host society
was one of “scientific racialism”—that is, it was believed to be scientifically “proven” that race
was real, deterministic, and that a clear racial hierarchy existed, with Whites at the top and
Blacks at the bottom (see Lieberman 2003 and Hiebert Menses 2007). Boas’ research on
immigrants challenged the then dominant racialist view, and strongly argued against the
presumed racial inferiority of migrants, like my grandfather, who were coming from southern
and eastern Europe (as well as other parts of the world).
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Although Boas had conducted cutting-edge research on immigrants to the United States,
his students showed less of an interest in this topic. Most of them either got into “salvage
anthropology” (i.e., conducting largely ethnohistorical research among Native American
groups—Boas himself had conducted such research among the Kwakiutl of the northwest coast
of North America) or were developing the field of culture and personality (e.g., Margaret Mead
and Ruth Benedict). However, beginning in the 1940s the Manchester School of social
anthropology in the U.K. took the lead in studies of immigration, urbanization, and ethnicity.
Focusing primarily on the Copperbelt of Zambia (then Northern Rhodesia), anthropologists such
as Max Gluckman, Abner Cohen, A. L. Epstein, J. Clyde Mitchell, and Edward Bruner produced
articles and manuscripts that would have a lasting impact on the study of immigration within
anthropology.
In the United States, sociologists from the University of Chicago and other nearby
universities, in what would come to be called the Chicago School, were conducting research on
various aspects of immigrant adaptation in the city of Chicago as early as the 1920s (Bulmer
1984). However, it would be the work of two other sociologists, one a future U.S. senator, that
challenged the dominant assimilationist view of immigrant adaptation, and helped usher in the
study of ethnic groups in the country. In 1963 Nathan Glazer and Patrick Moynihan published
their book Beyond the Melting Pot, which called into question that most cherished American
assimilationist metaphor. Though strictly a study of ethnicity maintenance and ethnic enclaves in
New York City, their analysis had a much broader application, and in some ways helped to
initiate the study of ethnicity maintenance among “white” ethnic groups (cf. Greeley 1969,
Novak 1973). For our purposes, Glazer and Moynihan’s study was also important because it
focused on ethnic enclaves, many of which we would today refer to as diasporas.
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In contexts outside the United States anthropologists were growing in their awareness of
the role ethnicity played in social organization, boundary formation, and intergroup relations.
The anthropologist Clifford Geertz recognized early on the impact of ethnicity in the nation-
building process taking place in many newly independent countries following colonialism, using
the phrase “primordial sentiments” to depict the power of these ethnic allegiances (Geertz 1963).
In 1969, Fredrik Barth published his very influential book Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: The
Social Organization of Cultural Difference, in which he made the astute observation that “The
critical focus of investigation…becomes the ethnic boundary that defines the group, not the
cultural stuff that it encloses” (1969, 15). In 1974 Urban Ethnicity was published with
contributions from several of the Manchester School as well as others who were doing research
on immigration, urbanization, ethnicity maintenance, and identity transformation. Thus
established as an important new focus of anthropological research and writing, the study of
ethnicity continued to grow throughout the 1970s and 1980s, producing a plethora of
anthropological, as well as other social scientific, analyses.
From Ethnic Groups to Diasporas and Transnationalism
One of the criticisms of the anthropological work on ethnicity during the 1970s and
1980s is that there was a tendency to view ethnic groups as clearly defined and well-bounded,
which led too often to studying such groups in isolation rather than in interaction with other
groups and individuals. As Steven Vertovec puts it, “…when the anthropology of ethnicity was
most thriving around the 1980s, the field was usually comprised of studies of identity and social
organization among one or another distinct ethnic group within a particular multi-ethnic (or post-
migration, ethnic majority-minority) setting…” (2007, 966). This started to change, however, in
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the late 1980s and early 1990s when anthropologists began to study not only the broader
sociocultural context in which members of ethnic groups interacted, but also the ties that many of
these groups maintained with their home communities. During this period a focus on diasporas
and transnationalism developed within the anthropological study of ethnicity and migration that
was largely based on the processes of globalization (e.g., more advanced and accessible
communications; ease and affordability of travel; the flow of capital across borders; indeed, the
efficacy of borders themselves in controlling the flow of migration and capital) (See, for
example, Glick Schiller, Basch, and Blanc-Szanton 1992; Clifford 1994; Kearney 1995, Cohen
1996; Brettell 2002; and Horevitz 2009).
While there is no consensus within anthropology (or missiology) as to what exactly
constitutes a diaspora, or how the current focus on diasporas and transnationalism differs from
studies of ethnic groups in the past, Lewellen argues that the minimal characteristics that
differentiate diasporas from migration in general are the “…dispersion from some center to two
or more territories, an enduring but not necessarily permanent resettlement abroad, and a sense of
common cultural identity among the scattered populations.” He continues,
It is the homeland, rather than simply economic interest or kinship networks, that forms
the basis for long-term group identity, that sets this people off from other ethnic groups,
and that helps form a transnational “imagined community” among people that have never
met (2002, 162).
In the anthropological literature, diasporas and transnationalism are intimately related.
Vertovec clearly articulates this connection:
The meaning of transnationalism which has perhaps been gaining most attention among
sociologists and anthropologists has to do with a kind of social formation spanning
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borders. Ethnic diasporas—what Kachig Tololyan (1991, p.5) has called “the exemplary
communities of the transnational moment”—have become the paradigm in this
understanding of transnationalism.
…[D]ispersed diasporas of old have become today’s “transnational communities”
sustained by a range of modes of social organization, mobility and communication
(Vertovec 1999, 449).
Reflecting the growing interest in diasporas among anthropologists, a cursory search of
the program of the 2010 American Anthropological Association’s annual meeting revealed that
approximately 150 papers, and 14 entire sessions, dealt with diasporas. Looking at the titles of
some of these papers and sessions helps us to see the variety of interest anthropologists have in
the phenomenon. Here is a small sampling:
� South Asian Indian Americans protesting the use of the image of Gandhi in a
fitness routine in the men’s magazine Maxim.
� The impact of the downturn of the U.S. economy on the flow of capital from the
Bosnian diaspora in Chicago to relatives in Bosnia Herzegovina.
� Examining the impact of social media by the diaspora on the Iranian protests
following the contested elections of 2009.
� The complex role played by hip hop music in mediating contact and mobilizing
images and ideas across different communities in Africa and the African
Diaspora, especially in the US.
� Constructing “Hmong-ness” in diaspora.
� Asian American fashion designers in China.
� Diasporic return, belonging and repatriation.
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� Making, unmaking, and remaking of community.
� The use of media in the construction of social identities among youth in diaspora.
� The elusiveness of boundaries in our globalized and transnational world.
� My favorite: “Basque-ing in play: games and song in revitalizing Basque in the
diaspora.”
We can see that anthropologists are interested in issues of identity, language maintenance, global
impact on economic flows of capital, media, the arts, reintegration of individuals upon their
return “home”, community development and change, and the use of social media by those in
diaspora to affect change at home. The link between diasporas, social media, and revolution at
home has become much more evident in light of the recent anti-government movements in North
Africa and throughout much of the Middle East. (Reflecting this, one family in Egypt named
their daughter “Facebook.” I hope it sounds better in Arabic).
HOW ANTHROPOLOGY CAN CONTRIBUTE TO
THE STUDY OF DIASPORA MISSIOLOGY
A key contribution anthropology can make to diaspora missiology is to apply the
analytical tools it has developed through its many years of interest in the migratory movements
of people to the current manifestations of diaspora communities. In a recent article in Missiology,
the Christian anthropologist Miriam Adeney applies the anthropological concepts of liminality,
cultural identity, and power relations to the analysis of Christian diaspora communities in the
U.S. These seem to me to provide a good framework in which to discuss several key issues
related to the anthropological contribution to diaspora missiology.
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Liminality
Liminality has to do with the sense of being in-between, of living in a “hyphenated
space” (see Thomassen 2009, van Gennep 1960, Turner 1967). While liminality may at times be
psychologically stressful and limiting (a person being neither/nor), it can also be used to develop
the ability to “make connections across borders” (both/and). In a globalized world, having
intercultural competency can be a great advantage for the furtherance of the Kingdom, and those
experiencing liminality as immigrants in a new land may have a greater opportunity to develop
this competency than those in the host society that have not experienced such in-betweenness
(Adeney 2011; see also Levitt 2009). Perhaps no one has better articulated this “theology of
marginality” than the Korean immigrant and theologian Jung Young Lee (1995). According to
Lee, the O.T. patriarchs, the Children of Israel, the disciples, and Jesus himself lived lives of
marginality, and therefore to be followers of Christ the church needs to see itself as being in a
liminal state—in-between and marginalized.
Liminality can also make people more receptive to the gospel as they have been
“uprooted” from their home culture and social structure. In the Basque Country of Spain, where I
have conducted most of my research, the evangelical churches until recently were populated
primarily with people who had migrated there from other parts of Spain, and their descendants.
In contrast, there are very few ethnic Basques in those churches (see Ybarrola 2009).
Additionally, studies of non-Christian diaspora religious communities in the United States
indicate that these communities tend to be more ecumenical than in their home context (Smart
1987). People in this liminal state are certainly affected by acts of love and kindness from those
in the host society. In this vein, the Christian anthropologist Brian Howell recently has called the
American church to reach out to these diaspora communities with “radical hospitality,
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compassion, and justice” where the church extends “material, legal, and social support to
vulnerable members of North American society, proclaiming the gospel in a context of
relationships of mutuality and engagement” (Howell 2011, 82, referring to the work of Conroy
2010).
Cultural Identity
Immigrant churches in North America often serve not only a religious function, but a
social one as well. It’s not unusual, for example, to find non-Christian Koreans attending church
functions as a way to socialize with their compatriots. In such an environment they can speak
their native language, experience Korean customs (such as food), and be with a people they
identify with ethnically, if not religiously. George Hunter refers to this as belonging before
believing (1992). But what of the 1.5 and 2nd
generation Koreans? These are the ones with the
hyphenated (or hybrid) identities—Korean-AMERICAN. The hyphenation reflects, once again,
their liminal status, where they may in some contexts be accepted as neither Korean nor
American, both Korean and American, not American but Korean, or not Korean but American.
Some studies have indicated that whereas Korean immigrants have been pretty successful in
passing their Protestant beliefs and practices to their children, they have been less successful in
transmitting their Korean cultural traditions to the succeeding generations (e.g., Min and Kim
2005). In her review of the book Religion and Spirituality in Korean America, Kate Bowler, of
Duke Divinity School, states, “Second-generation Korean American Christians are forging new
connections between their generational, ethnic, and religious identities. In short, they find new
ways to be all three: Koreans, Americans, Christians” (Bowler 2009).
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But what of those Christian diasporas that migrate to be intentionally missional, what has
been referred to as “reverse mission” (or in Andrew Walls’ terminology, the Great Reverse
Migration [2008])? What will happen with the 1.5 and 2nd
generation Nigerian-American
Pentecostals in Atlanta (Udotong 2010*)? Will these individuals use their liminal status to build
bridges between their Nigerian and American communities for the furtherance of the gospel?
Will they be more widely accepted in American society than their immigrant ancestors? Or will
they succumb to the secularizing influences of the dominant American society?
The transnational character of the newer diasporas also affects cultural identity. Since
many diasporas are maintaining strong ties to their “home” communities, identity is constructed
and negotiated based on the multi-localities in which these transnationals live. Vertovec states,
However termed, the multi-local life-world presents a wider, even more complex set of
conditions that affect the construction, negotiation and reproduction of social
identities. These identities play out and position individuals in the course of
their everyday lives within and across each of their places of attachment or
perceived belonging (2001, 578).
How do these transnational ties affect the adaptation and incorporation of Christian diasporas
into the host country and community? How does it affect their contextualizing of the gospel in
their new cultural surroundings? In some ways, “reverse mission” may suffer from some of the
same problems as mission from the West—too strong of an identity with, and influence from, the
home church or mission organization, which keeps the mission effort from being more effective
as it is viewed as something foreign in the new context. Udotong’s recent study of Nigerian
Pentecostals in Atlanta seems to indicate that this is a problem those churches are facing, which
is one of the factors that has limited them thus far to serving almost exclusively Nigerians in the
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area (2010). A challenge for Christians in diaspora, especially those who are intentionally
missional, is to maintain the vision and zeal they bring with them to evangelize the West,
something that the continual infusion and support of their home churches and communities can
facilitate, while at the same time adapting their church forms, worship styles, and even theology
to the cultural context in which they find themselves.
Power
“To the themes of liminality and cultural identity must be added the theme of power.
Multiculturalism is not a level playing field” (Adeney 2011, 13). Immigrants and diaspora
communities must understand the historical and sociocultural context they are entering, and
power dynamics are one of the keys to this understanding. All cultures have ways of categorizing
humans into different groups, and then assigning meaning to those groups. In the United States,
the ideology of race has had a profound impact on intergroup and interpersonal relations. By the
“ideology of race” I mean “a way of thinking about, speaking about, and organizing relations
among and within human groups” (Scupin 2002, 12). As Emerson and Smith put it,
In the post-Civil Rights United States, the racialized society is one in which intermarriage
rates are low, residential separation and socioeconomic inequality are the norm, our
definitions of personal identity and our choices of intimate associations reveal racial
distinctiveness, and where “we are never unaware of the race of a person with whom we
interact.” In short, and this is its unchanging essence, a racialized society is a society
wherein race matters profoundly for differences in life experiences, life opportunities,
and social relationships (2000, 7).
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As immigrants arrive in the United States, and as diaspora communities form, they will be
defined through this racial lens, which will impact their opportunities in the country both on the
macro and micro levels.
Although as a country we are all affected by this racialization, different segments of the
population will interpret immigrant communities in different ways. Elsewhere I have written
about the influence of social ideologies in interpreting the immigrant “Other” (Ybarrola 2009,
2011). These ideologies, as I use the term, are “schematic images of the social order” that are
“most distinctly, maps of problematic social reality and matrices for the creation of collective
conscience” (Geertz 1973, 218, 220). In the United States, the two dominant social ideologies
that affect the way we “see” the immigrant Other are the melting pot and multiculturalism. The
former is assimilationist in nature, and therefore is concerned whenever immigrants come in
large numbers as they may not be able to assimilate and will overwhelm “American” society and
culture. The latter tends to see America as a mosaic of many cultures, and therefore immigrants
are not a threat, but rather contribute to, and even reinforce, American values. As Adeney puts it,
injecting a theological argument reflecting this second ideology, “Like a mosaic, like the design
of a kaleidoscope, the whole spectrum of cultures enriches God’s world. They also enrich our
nation” (2011, 11). Immigrants and diasporas in the United States today should be cognizant of
these different ideologies (overly simplified here) as they will affect the way different segments
of the society view them, as well as social policies concerning them.
Transnationalism also has an impact on power dynamics. For example, to what extent are
diaspora Christian churches, especially those practicing “reverse mission”, still governed and
directed by the churches or organizations back “home”? How might this impact their
effectiveness on the local level? How might it provide encouragement and support to these
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communities as they negotiate their position in our racialized society? What are the networks
within the United States in which these Christian communities participate? How is power
distributed in such networks, and how much autonomy do the local congregations have? What
are the goods and services that flow back and forth between “home” and the diaspora
communities, as well as between different nodes of the network within the host country? So, in
examining power dynamics we must look both at the external relationship between the diaspora
and the host society as well as the internal one between the local congregation and its
home/networks.
Another area to explore regarding power dynamics is the impact Christian diaspora
communities have on the already established local churches. Here I’ll use the situation in the
Basque Country of Spain to illustrate this point. As I indicated earlier, traditionally the small
evangelical churches in the Basque Country were made up primarily of people who had migrated
to the Basque Country from other parts of Spain, and their descendants (see Ybarrola 2009). On
a visit there in 2001 I began noticing a few Latin Americans in the congregations (as well as in
the general society). In 2004, the number was larger, but they still represented a minority in the
churches. When I returned in 2009 I was amazed at the impact these Latin Americans were
having on these local congregations. For example, the church we attend while there, located in
the provincial capital of Donostia (San Sebastián), is one of the larger churches in the region.
When I attended their worship service in 2009, at least 90 percent of the congregation was made
up of Latin Americans (primarily from Colombia and Ecuador). However, not only had Latin
Americans entered the church, but the indigenous population had left (to where, I don’t yet
know). The leadership in the church is still indigenous, but the immigrants are taking on more
responsibility.
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The Latin Americans also bring different forms of Christianity with them. Most are from
Pentecostal backgrounds, but the churches in the Basque Country are not primarily Pentecostal;
the church we attend is based on the Brethren style of worship. The pastor of the church has had
to give a series of lectures to the Latin Americans about how they should comport themselves
during the worship service—e.g., only one person should pray at a time, and the others can pray
along in their heads, but not verbally, as was the custom of many of the immigrants. A
missionary there told me that he overheard one of the Latin American’s say to another that they
were just biding their time until they could take over the church.
The Latin Americans are also beginning to form their own diaspora churches. So far this
has mainly been limited to the Brazilians, who have had pastors/missionaries come from Brazil
to start what are essentially (at least at this point) diaspora congregations. A pastor from another
church in the Basque Country told me that when one of these pastors/missionaries arrived his
church lost 20 of its Brazilian members who left to become part of the Brazilian diaspora church.
When I spoke with one of these Brazilian pastors/missionaries, he told me that he was not there
just to minister to the Brazilians in diaspora, but also to reach out to the broader society.
However, like many of the “reverse mission” churches in the U.S., so far the church has not had
much of a local impact beyond the Brazilians.
As the Basque case illustrates, Christian diaspora communities can have a profound
impact on local congregations, especially in a context where those churches are relatively small
to begin with. In the Basque Country, the power may still be in the hands of the indigenous
leaders for the time being, but if the Latin Americans end up staying for a longer period of time,
it is likely that they will eventually move into leadership positions in these churches, and/or, as
has already begun to happen, form their own diaspora congregations. Ironically, although none
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of the churches in the Basque Country have a worship service in the Basque language (reflecting
their “Spanish” cultural identity), because of the influx of immigrants from Ecuador there is now
a Monday evening service in the Donostia church in Quechua!
A NEW PARTNERSHIP BETWEEN ANTHROPOLOGY AND MISSIOLOGY
Christian anthropologists and missiologists have long seen in the sub-discipline of
applied anthropology an important link between anthropology and missiology (see Luzbetak
1961 for an early connection between the two). I believe the study of diaspora missiology
provides us with another field in which we can see a potential partnership between the two
disciplines. Part of this can be attributed to the relatively recent, and growing, field of the
anthropology of Christianity (Haynes and Robbins 2008), which has produced some very good
ethnographic works on various aspects of the relationship between Christianity and
culture/society. In some ways it was inevitable that this focus of anthropological research would
develop given the unprecedented growth of Christianity in the Majority World, which could no
longer be explained away as simply the vestige of Western colonialism.
Recent years have witnessed an increased interest and attention being paid by
anthropologists to religious diaspora communities, and especially those that are Christian.
Indeed, two of the leading figures in the anthropological study of diasporas and transnationalism,
Nina Glick Schiller and Peggy Levitt, have both recently published articles that study
Christianity among diasporic and transnational communities. Glick Schiller’s article examines
“born again Christianity as a means of migrant incorporation locally and transnationally” in two
communities—one in the United States and the other in Germany (Glick Schiller, Caglar, and
Guldbrandsen 2006, 612). Levitt’s article “redefines the boundaries of belonging” by examining
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the transnational nature of religious institutional ties, using Catholics and Protestants, among
others, as case studies (Levitt 2004; see also Levitt 2007).
At the last American Anthropological Association’s annual meeting (November 2010)
papers were given on such topics as transnationalism and national politics among Lebanese
Christians in Senegal; Iraqi Christian culture makers in the United States; multilingualism,
translation, and authority among the Coptic Orthodox diaspora; and how religious identity,
including Catholicism and Charismatic Christianity, becomes transformed in the Maya diaspora.
At the same meetings the year before I attended several sessions where papers were given on
Christianity among diaspora populations, including those who were being intentionally
missional. Upon leaving those meetings, as well as after conversations with some of the
presenters, I was struck with the fact that many of our students at Asbury Seminary could have
presented papers that would have fit quite easily into these sessions, and been received very well.
Reflecting this convergence of interest between anthropology and missiology, two of the
leading journals representing each of these disciplines, Ethnic and Racial Studies (March 2011)
and Missiology (January 2011), dedicated their latest issues to the topic of diasporas and
transnationalism. Hopefully a new partnership is in the making.
CONCLUSION
As we have seen, anthropology has a long history with the study of migration,
urbanization, ethnicity, and identity that has, in more recent years, developed into the study of
diasporas and transnationalism. As a result, there is a great deal the discipline has to offer to the
even more recent field of diaspora missiology. In this presentation I have used the three
anthropological concepts employed by Adeney in her analysis of Christian diasporas—
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liminality, cultural identity, and power relations—but many more anthropological concepts and
theories could be utilized to better study and understand the various issues associated with
diaspora missiology.
However, we must proceed with the study of diasporas with caution. As I previously
mentioned, the concept of diaspora is not well-defined in anthropology or missiology, and this is
both a weakness and a strength. The weakness is that it becomes too broadly defined, thereby
losing some of its analytical power. In this regard, what Vertovec (2001, 576) observed
concerning transnationalism applies as well to the study of diasporas; it is “a notion that has
become over-used to describe too wide a range of phenomena.” But the answer to this criticism
is not to try and narrowly define diasporas, nor to make such a definition too complex. As
Rynkiewich has noted, citing the work of Dufoix (2008), “some definitions are too broad,
including all migration and settlement as examples of the phenomenon. Some definitions are
complex and, perhaps, include too much, thus eliminating some cases that we might want to
consider with the Diaspora model” (Rynkiewich 2011, npn). There is work to be done here, but
whatever definition or typologies we settle on, we must avoid trying to put too firm a boundary
around diaspora communities (i.e., essentializing their identities), seeing them rather as dynamic
and changing communities interacting in complex sociocultural contexts in the host society as
well as back home.
Let me end by returning to the immigration of my grandfather. At the turn of the 20th
century he left a tiny village in the Pyrenees mountains and made his way to the United States,
arriving first in New York, then traveling to California, where he joined the Basque diaspora
there. In many cities in California, as well as Nevada and Idaho, Basques established diaspora
enclaves, with their own hotels, boarding houses, and restaurants. In my grandfather’s later years
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my father would drop him off downtown where he would spend the day speaking Basque, eating
Basque food, and playing Basque card games. Like so many then as well as today, the diaspora
provided him with a home away from home.
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REFERENCES
Adeney, Miriam
2011 “Colorful Initiatives: North American Diasporas in Mission.” Missiology,
XXXIX(1):5-23.
Barth, Fredrik
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Culture Difference, ed. Fredrik Barth, 9-38. Boston: Little, Brown and Company.
Bowler, Kate
2009 “Generation K: Korean American Evangelicals.” Books and Culture, May/June.
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http://www.booksandculture.com/articles/2009/mayjun/generationk.html.
Brettell, Caroline
2002 “Migrants and Transmigrants, Borders and Identity: Anthropology and the New
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Bulmer, Martin
1984 The Chicago School of Sociology: Institutionalization, Diversity, and the Rise of
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Clifford, James
1994 “Diasporas.” Cultural Anthropology, 9(3): 302-338.
Cohen, Abner, ed.
1974 Urban Ethnicity. New York: Tavistock Publications.
Cohen, Robin
1996 “Diasporas and the Nation-State: From Victims to Challengers.” International
Affairs, 72(3): 507-520.
Conroy, Phillip
2010 “A Biblical Missiology for North American People Groups.” Retrieved February
27, 2011 online: http://staging.namb.net/nambpb.aspx?pageid=8589967111.
Dufoix, Stephane
2008 Diasporas. University of California Press.
Emerson, Michael, and Christian Smith
2000 Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America. New
York: Oxford University Press.
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Geertz, Clifford
1963 “The Integrative Revolution: Primordial Sentiments and Civil Politics in the New
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