Memories of a Future Home Diasporic Citizenship of Chinese in Panama [Hardcover]

While the history of Asian migration to Latin America is well documented, we know little about the contemporary experience of diasporic Asians in this part of the world.Memories of a Future Homeoffers an intimate look at how diasporic Chinese in Panama construct a home and create a sense of belonging as they inhabit the interstices of several cultural-national formationsPanama, their nation of residence; China/Taiwan, their ethnic homeland; and the United States, the colonial force.Juxtaposing the concepts of diaspora and citizenship, this book offers an innovative framework to help us understand how diasporic subjects engage the politics of cultural and political belonging in a transnational context. It does so by examining the interaction between continually shifting geopolitical dynamics, as well as the maneuvers undertaken by diasporic people to negotiate and transform those conditions. In essence, this book explores the contingent citizenship experienced by diasporic Chinese and their efforts to imagine and construct home in diaspora. [The] theoretical framework of this ethnography, of diasporic citizenship and the fluidity of culture and identities (albeit firmly embedded in power relations), should represent a point of departure for a fuller and perhaps more inclusive discussion of the intersections of culture and politics in the hemisphere as a whole. Journal of Latin American StudiesThis book is an intimate look at how diasporic Chinese in Panama construct notions of home and create a sense of belonging as they inhabit the interstices of several cultural-national formationsPanama, China/Taiwan, and the United States. Lok Siu has written a fascinating story about the Chinese living in Panama, equally vulnerable to memories of home and the ruptures of nationalist politics. The notion of diasporic citizenship captures a kind of interstitial belonging shaped by cross-currents of culture and politics, most recently including ripples from emelC™