ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts on the concepts covered in this book. The book discusses the shortcomings of a view of migration. Migration theory, too, has undergone significant transformations in the last three decades or so, with compelling theories of migration emerging from a range of disciplines. As with diaspora theory, disciplinary divides remain significant, with economists and demographers interested in 'push' and 'pull' factors in a global labour market and in 'human capital'. While deepening understanding of contemporary forms of migration, transnationalism has been criticized for being ahistorical, for privileging the 'new' over older forms of transnational connection and for ignoring the ways in which ideas of identity and culture are historically structured. Yet research in the borderlands of Bengal, and in particular the mobility of brides, suggests that 'diaspora' also includes small journeys which are nonetheless characterized by profound rupture and the impossibility of return.
