Peripheries at the centre. Borderland schooling in interwar Europe

Abstract

in Peru, only to suffer a second expulsion, impact a sense of identity? To what do we attach our sense of belonging – nation, culture, shared intellectual and political ideology, family? Is identity not plural and is culture not hybrid? How do we express this identity? How do we maintain a connection with others in the diaspora? Which language do we use? What names do we choose for ourselves and for our children? (378) ‘Names, like passports, often contain a trace of fear’. Reading this book is more like listening to a storyteller who introduces members of their family to you, breaks off from time to time to fill the reader in on relevant background, muses on how they must have felt, and discusses the significance of what they are describing all without breaking flow. It is at the same time absorbing and thought provoking. The images it creates and the issues it raises stay in the mind long after the story is told.