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The geo-political world of today has moved beyond the classificatory nation-state, and academic vocabulary has reinvented 'diaspora' to encompass social formations and cultural patterns, marked as they are by the mass movement of peoples, an information technology (IT) boom, and different focal points of global influence. Generally, 'diaspora' is used to describe de-territorialised and transnational ethnic groups, and is used to indicate a specific type of consciousness, a mode of cultural production, and a particular social form (Vertovec and Cohen, 1999). These three distinctions focus attention on the role of imagination and consciousness in the lives of people in the diaspora.
In the contemporary world, globalisation has made home and host societies a 'single arena of action' and has made it possible for individuals and groups to participate directly in global processes because their actions do not have to be mediated by the nation-state (Sheffer, 2003). Diasporas, characterised by numerous dislocated sites of contestation and resistance, counteract the hegemonic and homogenising forces of globalisation (Braziel and Mannur, 2003): for example, in the way people and culture in the diaspora, in different locations, are set not only in their practices but also in their lifestyles. In examining the diverse literature on diaspora and transnationalism, diaspora networks can be said to be a key component. Through these social networks, the past is retained, the present becomes a lived reality, and the future can be imagined. Moreover, the connectedness that these networks create is more obvious in the transnational sphere in which they operate than in the places of their origin (Raj, 2005).
In the case of diasporas, social networks and associations operate at three distinct levels-the household, the local ethnic community, and the 'global Indian' (Kurien, 2003) - and serve as resources for diaspora communities, assisting with their segmented integration, identity negotiation, social mobility, and homeland advocacy. It is, therefore, contended that the more an individual or group is connected to others through new ITs, the more there is a chance of defying the imperative of geography and operating in the transnational sphere. Most social networks at the household level are focused around the places of worship, ethnic shopping, family gatherings, and other social occasions. At the next level (i.e. the community), networks are formed on the...