ABSTRACT
The ‘ecological paradigm’, while denying the centrality of the ‘cultural stuff’ enclosed within ethnic boundaries, was the structural scaffolding on which diacritical emblems or ‘diacritica’ perched, signalling boundaries between ethnic groups. This chapter describes against the ‘niche’ or ecological paradigm, for a far more dynamic view of ethnic boundaries. It shows that the ecological paradigm of ethnic boundaries put forward by Fredrik Barth was highly innovative in recognising the constructedness of ‘culture’. The political imaginaries marking out ethnic communities as ‘bounded’ are nurtured and publicised by organic intellectuals at the centre, including writers, singers and other popular cultural producers. Complex diasporas defy any neat typological theorisations of diaspora that look to national historical origins exclusively as determining the groups that may be defined as diasporas. Intersectionality theory exposes the hegemonic silencing of some unmarked groups, enabling this silencing to be ‘confronted and curtailed’.
