Gilroy is a UK-born Black scholar and this concept has been highly influential. For our purposes, it is especially significant because it encourages us to see African Diasporic history and identity, not as land-mass-based (e.g., "continents"), but much more as a product of coastal and trans-Atlantic travel and exchange. African Diasporic identity happening precisely because Atlantic coasts and shipping lanes made the Diaspora physically possible (if very painful)