The Greek diaspora is one of the paradigmatic historical diasporas. Though some trace its origins to ancient Greek colonies, it is really a more modern phenomenon. Diaspora, exile and immigration represent three successive phases in Modern Greek history and they are useful vantage points from which to analyse changes in Greek society, politics and culture over the last three centuries.

Embracing a wide range of case studies, this volume charts the role of territorial displacements as social and cultural agents from the eighteenth century to the present day and examines their impact on communities, politics, institutional attitudes and culture. By studying migratory trends the aim is to map out the transformation of Greece from a largely homogenous society with a high proportion of emigrants to a more diverse society inundated by immigrants after the end of the Cold War. The originality of this book lies in the bringing together of diaspora, exile and immigration and its focus on developments both inside and outside Greece.

Contents: Introduction, Dimitris Tziovas; Part I Society and Politics: The Emigré Experience: Case Studies: Tales from the dark side: transnational migration, the underworld and the 'other' Greeks of the diaspora, Thomas W. Gallant; Silent minority: the Greek community in 18th-century London, Jonathan Harris; Greek merchants in Victorian England, Maria Christina Chatziioannou; Repatriation, migration or readjustment: Egyptian Greek dilemmas of the 1950s, Anthony Gorman; Searching for a Motherland: Slav-Macedonian political refugees in the People's Republic of Macedonia (1944–2003), Iakovos D. Michailidis; No place is (like) home: mobilities, memories and metamorphoses of Greek migrants in Denmark, Anastasia Christou; National Centre and Transnational Periphery: A Greece for Greeks by descent? 19th-century policy on integrating the Greek diaspora, Elpida Vogli; Defining the changing boundaries of Greek nationality, Dimitris Christopoulos; 'Deterritorialising' the nation: the Greek state and 'ecumenical Hellenism', Lina Venturas; The limits of political transnationalism: the Greek American lobby 1970s–1990s, Alexander Kitroeff. Part II Literature and Culture: Indigenous foreigners: Greek diaspora and travel writing (1880–1930), Dimitris Tziovas; Between language, land and empire: humanist and orientalist perspectives on Egyptian-Greek identity, Alexander Kazamias; The poetics of transit: exile, diaspora and repatriation in Stratis Tsirkas's novels, Eleni Papargyriou; 'Be it ever so humble': nostalgia for home and the problem of return in post-war Greek novels, Gerasimus Katsan; The politics of memory in the fiction of Greek political exiles in Eastern Europe, Venetia Apostolidou; The return of Nikitas Randos: satire, memory and otherness in the post-war poetry of Nicholas Calas, Lena Hoff; The Topos of home in new Greek-American writing, Martha Klironomos; Repatriation on screen: national culture and the immigrant other since the 1990s, Dimitris Papanikolaou; The diaspora sings back: rebetika down under, Stathis Gauntlett; Index.

About the Editor: Dimitris Tziovas is Professor of Modern Greek Studies at the University of Birmingham

Reviews: ‘… this collection of essays constitutes a valuable contribution to the study of the overseas Greeks.’ Richard Clogg, Anglo-Hellenic Review

'This welcome and innovative volume brings together a set of international contributors from different disciplines, as well as from different institutional and national backgrounds...' European History Quarterly

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Introduction

Index