Craig White's Literature Courses Terms / Themes Diaspora

Oxford English Dictionary: [<Gk dispersion]
The Dispersion; i.e. (among the Hellenistic Jews) the whole body of Jews living dispersed among the Gentiles after the Captivity (John vii. 35);
(among the early Jewish Christians) the body of Jewish Christians outside of Palestine (Jas. i. 1, 1 Pet. i. 1).

"the movement, migration, or scattering of people away from an established or ancestral homeland" or "people dispersed by whatever cause to more than one location", or "people settled far from their ancestral homelands" [Wikipedia]

Thus diaspora may describe historical mass-dispersions of people with common ethnic identities, particularly movements of an involuntary nature, e.g..

 the Black Diaspora of Africans in the Americas (and beyond) via the slave trade (see also Pan-Africanism);

or more voluntary dispersions such as the Hispanic Diaspora or the Indian Diaspora (from South Asia).

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