Multiculture and Multiculturalism:

Conversation across Differences29 November 2010

ACCEPT PluralismLaunch event

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ACCEPT Pluralism

• 15 partner countries, 3 NGOs• Funded by European Commission

7th Framework Programme

• Conditions for tolerance, respect and social cohesion across Europe

• Conflicts and contestations over cultural diversity

• Tolerance, respect and accommodation in values, practices and institutions

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Three ‘classes’ of acceptance

1)Toleration sought but not granted: intolerance, rejection, exclusion

2) Toleration sought and granted: individual and collective, grudging or indifferent, minimalist modus vivendi

3) Toleration not enough: other, more demanding responses sought: respect, recognition, equality

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Differences in Multicultural Britain

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‘Two kinds of differences’

Associational IdentitiesPractices-based

Identities

‘Race +

Culture’ /

Ethnicity

1. New Ethnicities 2. Ethno-cultural Groups

‘Race +

Religion’

3. Associational Ethno-

religious Identities

4. Ethno-religious

Communities

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Multiculturalism/Multiculture

Multiculturalism• creation of public spaces that allow for, refrain from

penalizing, and, ideally, respect the simultaneous assertion of claims for difference and inclusion

• allowing for the expression of religious beliefs and the accommodation of religious practices in the public rather than their confinement in the private realm

Multiculture• situations of everyday cultural and ethnic diversity,

conviviality and particularly the Black-Caribbean experience• the “promise and hetero-cultural dynamism of contemporary

metropolitan life” (Gilroy) • the emergence of new cultural forms, hybrid identities

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Relating multiculture / multiculturalism

How to conceive of a relationship so that…

• neither of the two differences is reduced to the conceptual/normative vocabulary of the other;

• both are allowed to specify their own conceptions of culture and politics;

• ‘double accommodation’ is possible.

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Muslim Council of Britain: School Guidance

• 2007: MCB issues guidance notes ‘Meeting the needs of Muslim pupils in state schools’

• Ensuing controversy

• What are ‘the needs’ of Muslim pupils? • What does it mean to be ‘sensitive’

and ‘respectful’? • What does tolerance and respect for

ethno-religious difference imply? How is it negotiated locally?

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Black History Month and the Bicentennial of the Abolition

• 2007: bicentennial celebrations of the abolition of slavery

• ‘Britishness’ and the History and Citizenship curriculum (Michael Gove, Niall Ferguson)

• How can the ‘national story’ be adapted?

• How are ‘national stories’ negotiated, adapted and discussed locally, eg. at school?

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Practical encounters of ‘two differences’

‘Multicultural’ consists of two modes of difference, but not only do we not have to choose between them but mutual respect is possible.

Study of encounters of ‘two differences’ in practice:

- What does tolerance/respect/recognition look like for the claims of multiculture and multiculturalism?

- How can ‘double accommodation’ be achieved?

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