Bridging the gap between migration studies and the anthropological tradition, Ghassan Hage illustrates that transnationality and its attendant cultural consequences are not necessarily at odds with classic theory.
In The Diasporic Condition, Ghassan Hage engages with the diasporic Lebanese community as a shared lifeworld, defining a common cultural milieu that transcends spatial and temporal distance-a collective mode of being here termed the "diasporic condition." Encompassing a complicated transnational terrain, Hage's long-term ethnography takes us from Mehj and Jalleh in Lebanon to Europe, Australia, South America, and North America, analyzing how Lebanese migrants and their families have established themselves in their new homes while remaining socially, economically, and politically related to Lebanon and to each other.
At the heart of The Diasporic Condition lies a critical anthropological question: How does the study of a particular sociocultural phenomenon expand our knowledge of modes of existing in the world? As Hage establishes what he terms the "lenticular condition," he breaks down the boundaries between "us" and "them," "here" and "there," showing that this convergent mode of existence increasingly defines everyone's everyday life.
Bridging the gap between migration studies and the anthropological tradition, Ghassan Hage illustrates that transnationality and its attendant cultural consequences are not necessarily at odds with classic theory.
In The Diasporic Condition, Ghassan Hage engages with the diasporic Lebanese community as a shared lifeworld, defining a common cultural milieu that transcends spatial and temporal distance-a collective mode of being here termed the "diasporic condition." Encompassing a complicated transnational terrain, Hage's long-term ethnography takes us from Mehj and Jalleh in Lebanon to Europe, Australia, South America, and North America, analyzing how Lebanese migrants and their families have established themselves in their new homes while remaining socially, economically, and politically related to Lebanon and to each other.
At the heart of The Diasporic Condition lies a critical anthropological question: How does the study of a particular sociocultural phenomenon expand our knowledge of modes of existing in the world? As Hage establishes what he terms the "lenticular condition," he breaks down the boundaries between "us" and "them," "here" and "there," showing that this convergent mode of existence increasingly defines everyone's everyday life.
Ghassan Hage is professor of anthropology and social theory at the University of Melbourne in Australia. He is the author of several books, including White Nation, Against Paranoid Nationalism, After-Politics, and Is Racism an Environmental Threat?
"This sophisticated, captivating ethnography demonstrates how
anthropological understanding can be applied to a diasporic mode of
living and how the mobile subject contributes to expanding analyses
of culture, belonging, and place. . . . Highly recommended."
*Choice*
“With his typical creative brilliance, Hage probes the diverse and
divergent angles through which Lebanon appears in migratory
memories and movement, and, in the process, upends our
understanding of the politics of ancestry and inheritance in
diasporic worlds.”
*Elizabeth A. Povinelli, author of The Inheritance*
“With this book, Hage carefully journeys us through the complex
experiences of the Lebanese diasporic condition. Living in an
internationalized space of viability, the Lebanese are shown to
occupy a multiplicity of entangled and flickering realities—always
engaged and always aware that, in the end, they are stuck with each
other. The journey is exquisite, painful, exhilarating, saddening,
inspiring, and deeply human. The Diasporic Condition is a must-read
for both the Lebanese and the non-Lebanese.”
*Suad Joseph, University of California, Davis*
"The Diasporic Condition is a beautifully crafted book. Thoroughly
enjoyable and evocative—not to mention incredibly resonant for
Lebanese diasporic subjects and students of Lebanon—this
thought-provoking book is sure to whet the intellectual appetite of
a wide readership."
*Mashriq & Mahjar*
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