A culture of war and exile

During a thirty-years war of independence from Ethiopia (1961-1991) almost a third of the Eritrean population left the country. This article focuses on the encounters of second-generation Eritrean exiles in Germany with their compatriots in Eritrea. The author argues that in spite of the close-knit transnational networks between Eritrea and its sizable diaspora, journeys to Eritrea reveal the gap between a culture of war and a culture of exile. Until Eritrea’s independence in 1991 this gap was obscured by a strong sense of long-distance nationalism and the actual impossibility of home and exile communities coming face to face with each other. The second exile generation being brought up to identify as Eritreans abroad, often experience alienation and even rejection « at home » which forces them to renegotiate their identity and re-construct diasporic organisations and modes of interaction with the homeland. This on-going development may also help to shed light on the more general question of the viability of transnational links beyond the immigrant generation.