GHOSTS OF DIASPORA: Hauntology, Hip-Hop and Diasporic Memory in the Colonial Anthropocene

This essay explores the political imagination of the post-war hinge generation of the Salvadorian diasporic subjectivity. Through the ethnographic narrative of hip-hop recording artist Cheko7even and the creation of a hauntological project entitled “The Migrant Report” and the adaptation screenplay entitled, Adrift, the Salvador Alvarenga Story, we explore hegemonic power over memory and the role of our transmissions in identity formation in the diaspora. By extracting themes from the lyrical narrative of the album, the essay explores the rhizome-like assemblages of our diasporic imagination through the modalities of hauntology, political ecology, social work and hip-hop. The essay attempts to creatively thread personal story and global counter-currents to argue for the benefits of diasporic subjectivities to in creating emancipatory narratives that bridge the West-South divide, as well argue for the use of experimental modalities of cultural production to produce counter-subjectivities from the diasporic political imagination.