Abstract

Why is it still so difficult to negotiate differences across cultures? In what ways does racism continue to strike at the foundations of multiculturalism? Bringing together some of the world's most influential postcolonial theorists, this classic collection examines the place and meaning of cultural hybridity in the context of growing global crisis, xenophobia and racism. Starting from the reality that personal identities are multicultural identities, Debating Cultural Hybridity illuminates the complexity and the flexibility of culture and identity, defining their potential openness as well as their closures, to show why anti-racism and multiculturalism are today still such hard roads to travel.
Pnina Werbner is professor emerita in social anthropology at Keele University. She is an urban anthropologist who has studied Muslim South Asians in Britain and Pakistan and, more recently, the women’s movement and the Manual Workers Union in Botswana. Tariq Modood is professor of sociology, politics and public policy at the University of Bristol and the founding director of the Centre for the Study of Ethnicity and Citizenship. His website is www.tariqmodood.com.
'It is marvellous to see this early collection of classic insightful articles on hybridity published again, with new introductions.' Jan Nederveen Pieterse, University of California, Santa Barbara 'An indispensable classic text for anyone interested in a complex and nuanced analysis of questions of culture, identity and hybridity.' Professor Avtar Brah, Birkbeck University of London, and co-editor of Hybridity and its Discontents 'In the globalised world of the twenty-first century, cultural mixing and ethnic cross-fertilisation is a commonplace experience. Debating Cultural Hybridity offers a superb set of essays to understand the complexity of this experience and its political and social implications.' Ien Ang, University of Western Sydney 'This new edition of Werbner and Modood's Debating Cultural Hybridity is at once timely and insightful. For it arrives at a time when the debate on multiculturalism and racism has become more urgent not just in Europe and in North America, but also in the various parts of the global South that have been the sources for the urgent interrogations of the project of social modernity. It is a must for all people concerned with the burning questions of our current time.' Ato Quayson, University of Toronto 'The reissue of these seminal essays reminds us that the turn to hybridity was never an invitation to celebration, but rather a challenge to think about the necessary conditions for an emancipatory politics. Given the civilizational hierarchy and liberal homogeneity that has informed the racisms of the "war on terror" era, their exploration of the complex task of building anti-racist alliances remains vital.' Gavan Titley, Maynooth University, and Co-Author of The Crises of Multiculturalism 'This work, written by some of the most eminent current social theorists, is even more necessary today than when it was first published. Its approach is timely not only for its content but for what it implies: the need to focus on inter-culture and inter-action approaches, and to recognise new forms of cultural complexity in identities.' Professor Ricard Zapata-Barrero, Pompeu Fabra University, and founder of the Interdisciplinary Research Group on Immigration 'With its prescient, rigorous examination of cultural hybridity and emancipatory politics, this landmark volume still has much to teach us nearly twenty years on. Indeed, reading it again in light of subsequent political developments makes its contribution all the more striking and compelling.' Professor Stephen May, University of Auckland 'The volume continues to be the indispensable guide to hybridity. Many of the contributions to the volume have become classics but their genuine value is that they still allow us to discover elements of a politics of difference that responds to our current conjecture.' Jan Dobbernack, University of Lincoln