Diasporic Postcolonialism and Its Antinomies

This essay calls into question a certain viewpoint that has become widespread in postcolonial cultural theory with respect to the representation of phenomena grouped loosely under the rubric of diaspora. The viewpoint in question can be called “diasporism,” referring to a pro-diaspora sensibility that has been and is being articulated in various disciplinary enclaves for at least the last two decades— principally in Jewish cultural studies but also in Black British, Asian American, and postcolonial cultural studies. Disillusioned by the Zionist dismissal of the legitimacy of diaspora as a “normal”— indeed, a desirable—form of existence, some Jewish cultural theorists have sought to articulate an affirmative view of diasporic culture, emphasizing its power to provide a fitting alternative to territorialized notions of Jewish identity (e.g., Boyarin and Boyarin; Omer, “Palestine,” 147). To these critics, it remains a matter of pride that Judaism, along with most of modern Jewish culture, was itself fashioned in the diaspora; hence any charges that Jewish life in the galut (exile) is uncreative or inferior to life in the state of Israel are unsustainable. A good example of this diasporist outlook can be found in Philip Roth’s 1993 novel Operation Shylock, whose main character, also named Philip Roth, preaches “diasporism” as a happier alternative to living in the war-torn State of Israel. George Steiner’s widely discussed essay, “Our Homeland, The Text” similarly proclaims a diasporist sensibility, seeking to locate the Jewish homeland not in the enclosed territory of a nation-state but in the deterritorialized idioms of rabbinic spiritual and discursive traditions. There are, of course, many more such sources.