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Usable Pasts, Staging Belongings: Articulating a ‘Heritage’ of Multiculturalism in Canada
Author(s) -
Leung Carrianne K.Y.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
studies in ethnicity and nationalism
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.204
H-Index - 8
eISSN - 1754-9469
pISSN - 1473-8481
DOI - 10.1111/j.1754-9469.2006.tb00155.x
Subject(s) - usable , multiculturalism , history , media studies , political science , sociology , computer science , world wide web , law
Notions of national heritage and identity are complicated in Canada, a settler nation with its central characteristic presented as institutionalised multiculturalism. Popular and official discourses of heritage and multiculturalism work together to produce ideas of Canadian‐ness. The twin objectives of this paper are to describe how representations of racial difference are used as a resource to produce notions of official multiculturalism and a ‘heritage of multiculturalism’ discourse — or how notions of multiculturalism emerge as an integral part of national culture/heritage/identity. I argue that the conceptualisation of ‘heritage’ and ‘multiculturalism’ are produced through the representation of racialised difference in national narratives and that taken together, the two discourses act as a highly flexible form of governmentality.