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Diaspora Politics, Homeland Erotics, and the Materializing of Memory

Diaspora Politics, Homeland Erotics, and the Materializing of Memory positrons 7:j 0 1999 by Duke University Press. lages in southwest China where they situate their origins. In those villages they have learned, to their great discomfort, that there have been Hmong American male tourists before them who indulged in the favors of local young women. It is not the potential formation of transnational marriages that makes these Hmong American women indignant. Instead, it is that the male tourists promise escape from peasant life through marriage but only spend a lascivious evening with a homeland girl and then move on. These vignettes, severed from their contexts, highlight the complex junctures that inhere in homeland politics and that remain undertheorized in diaspora studies. Before filling out the respective contexts within which these instances can be interpreted, let me chart the trajectory of my arguments. T h e homeland, at least for Hmong in the West, is multiple. Homeland desire fragments, as nostalgic imaginings span out over Asia, giving rise to diverse practices of recovery. These practices, moreover, are fully imbricated with politics and economics, both in terms of global geohistorical developments and in terms internal to the Hmong community in the United States. T h e plural character of http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png positions asia critique Duke University Press

Diaspora Politics, Homeland Erotics, and the Materializing of Memory

Schein, Louisa
positions asia critique , Volume 7 (3) – Dec 1, 1999
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Publisher
Duke University Press
Copyright
Copyright 1999 by Duke University Press
ISSN
1067-9847
eISSN
1527-8271
DOI
10.1215/10679847-7-3-697
Publisher site
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Abstract

positrons 7:j 0 1999 by Duke University Press. lages in southwest China where they situate their origins. In those villages they have learned, to their great discomfort, that there have been Hmong American male tourists before them who indulged in the favors of local young women. It is not the potential formation of transnational marriages that makes these Hmong American women indignant. Instead, it is that the male tourists promise escape from peasant life through marriage but only spend a lascivious evening with a homeland girl and then move on. These vignettes, severed from their contexts, highlight the complex junctures that inhere in homeland politics and that remain undertheorized in diaspora studies. Before filling out the respective contexts within which these instances can be interpreted, let me chart the trajectory of my arguments. T h e homeland, at least for Hmong in the West, is multiple. Homeland desire fragments, as nostalgic imaginings span out over Asia, giving rise to diverse practices of recovery. These practices, moreover, are fully imbricated with politics and economics, both in terms of global geohistorical developments and in terms internal to the Hmong community in the United States. T h e plural character of

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positions asia critique – Duke University Press

Published: Dec 1, 1999

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