The increased movement of people coupled with the rise of communications technology has made it possible for ever larger groups of mobile people to maintain contact with their homelands over vast distances. The term ‘diaspora’ is increasingly employed to describe these relations and it is used widely by academics, policy-makers, and national and supra-national institutions. The proliferation of diasporas linked with increasing academic and student mobility/migration has contributed to shaping the contemporary diasporic conditions in many (internationalising) national higher education systems. Yet despite this growing phenomenon, and increasing national policy initiatives to engage with diasporas, there has been rather less research on the complex relationship between diaspora and higher education, and particularly scholarship around internationalisation. Through contributions from scholars from around the world, we aim to critically examine diverse theoretical perspectives and empirical cases of diaspora and how they connect with and inform the theme of internationalisation in higher education.