After the cosmopolitan? : multicultural cities and the future of racism / Michael Keith.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Keith, Michael, 1960-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Sociology, Urban.

Cultural pluralism.

Racism.

Physical Description:

viii, 237 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

London ; New York : Routledge, 2005.

Summary:

The majority of the world's population now lives in cities. The social, cultural and economic problems and opportunities that are generated by this extraordinary concentration of people have become symbolic of the contemporary human condition. This burgeoning of city life has in particular led to progressively greater concentrations of demographic groups from increasingly diverse backgrounds and resulted in new forms of cultural conflict and cultural dialogue.

In After the Cosmopolitan? Michael Keith argues that both racial divisions and intercultural dialogue can only be understood in the context of the urbanism through which they are realised. The author addresses debates in cultural theory and urban studies about the growth of cultural industries and the marketing of cities, the debates around social exclusion and violence, the big debate in the States around the nature of the ghetto, the cross disciplinary conceptualisation of cultural hybridity and the politics of third way social policy. Through this Keith considers the ways in which race is played out in the streets of some of the world's most eminent cities and argues that neither the utopian naivete of some invocations of cosmopolitan democracy nor the pessimism of multicultural hell can adequately make sense of the changing nature of contemporary metropolitan life.

This authoritative book will be of interest to advanced undergraduates, postgraduates and researchers across the disciplines of anthropology, architecture, cultural studies, geography, politics, social policy and sociology.

Contents:

1 Introduction: Globalisation, urbanism and cosmopolitanism fever 1

2 The mirage at the heart of the myth? Thinking about the white city 23

3 After the cosmopolitan? The limits of the multicultural city and the mutability of racism 37

4 The ghetto: Knowing your place and the performative cartographies of racial subordination 61

5 Ethnic entrepreneurs and street rebels: Looking inside the inner city 81

6 The street: Street sensibility? 97

7 The cultural quarter: Globalisation, hybridity and curating exotica 112

8 Tagging the city: Graffiti practice and transcultural communication 136

9 The cartographies of community safety: Mapping danger and rumours of risk 153

10 The plan: Knowing urbanism: between the allure of the cosmopolitan and the horror of the postcolony 166.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

041534168X

0415341698

OCLC:

56777562