IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/asiaeu/v10y2012i4p267-285.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Between policy and reality: multiculturalism, the second generation, and the third space in Britain

Author

Listed:
  • Sharmani Gabriel
  • Edmund Gomez
  • Zarine Rocha

Abstract

Despite the significant level of cultural diversity that exists in contemporary Europe as a consequence of immigration and diaspora, state policies on multiculturalism in several countries have not kept pace with the complex and dynamic processes created by these pluralising social forces and realities. This has given rise to exclusionary contexts that have led to feelings of alienation by immigrant communities. In Britain, the violent street confrontations in Bradford in 2001 and the London bombings of 2005 both epitomised, as well as were outcomes of, the British nation state’s failure to foster dialogue and a sense of inclusion among these communities. Foregrounding the extent of the grievances and frustrations prevalent in British society, these social disturbances have also contributed to renewed debates on issues of national identity, belonging, and multiculturalism. More importantly, these clashes, involving mostly the second-generation British Asian Muslim community, have brought to the fore the dissonance between assumptions of belonging underlying “state multiculturalism”, which moves to fix and stabilise identities, and those that inform the complex processes of identification and constructions of the “third space” of belonging by racialised minority communities. Focusing on Britain, this paper’s central hypothesis is that official multiculturalism has failed to take into account the fluid and heterogeneous frames in and through which second-generation British Asians ground their cultural and political identities and demands. As many of the nation states in Europe are today, like Britain, multiethnic in composition with expanding Asian communities, how successfully or not Britain modifies its integration policies with respect to the presence of minorities of immigrant origin has enormous implications not only for Europe but also for Asia and Asia–Europe relations. Copyright Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2012

Suggested Citation

  • Sharmani Gabriel & Edmund Gomez & Zarine Rocha, 2012. "Between policy and reality: multiculturalism, the second generation, and the third space in Britain," Asia Europe Journal, Springer, vol. 10(4), pages 267-285, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:kap:asiaeu:v:10:y:2012:i:4:p:267-285
    DOI: 10.1007/s10308-012-0337-z
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s10308-012-0337-z
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10308-012-0337-z?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. S. Karthick Ramakrishnan, 2004. "Second‐Generation Immigrants? The “2.5 Generation” in the United States," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 85(2), pages 380-399, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. van Ours, J.C. & Veenman, J.M.C., 2008. "How Interethnic Marriages Affect the Educational Attainment of Children : Evidence from a Natural Experiment," Other publications TiSEM e9795303-c58f-469e-97b7-8, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    2. Sweetman, A. & van Ours, J.C., 2014. "Immigration : What About the Children and Grandchildren?," Discussion Paper 2014-009, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    3. Watkins, Adam M. & Melde, Chris, 2009. "Immigrants, assimilation, and perceived school disorder: An examination of the "other" ethnicities," Journal of Criminal Justice, Elsevier, vol. 37(6), pages 627-635, November.
    4. Christopher D. Smith & Jonas Helgertz & Kirk Scott, 2019. "Time and Generation: Parents’ Integration and Children’s School Performance in Sweden, 1989–2011," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 35(4), pages 719-750, October.
    5. Julie Park & Stephanie Nawyn & Megan Benetsky, 2015. "Feminized Intergenerational Mobility Without Assimilation? Post-1965 U.S. Immigrants and the Gender Revolution," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 52(5), pages 1601-1626, October.
    6. Delia Furtado, 2009. "Cross-nativity marriages and human capital levels of children," Research in Labor Economics, in: Ethnicity and Labor Market Outcomes, pages 273-296, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    7. repec:pri:cmgdev:wp0701 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Siahaan, Freddy & Lee, Daniel Y. & Kalist, David E., 2014. "Educational attainment of children of immigrants: Evidence from the national longitudinal survey of youth," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 1-8.
    9. Tom Kleinepier & Helga de Valk, 2016. "Ethnic differences in family trajectories of young adult women in the Netherlands: Timing and sequencing of events," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 35(24), pages 671-710.
    10. van Ours, Jan C. & Veenman, Justus, 2008. "How Interethnic Marriages Affect the Educational Attainment of Children; Evidence from a Natural Experiment," CEPR Discussion Papers 6688, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    11. Laurence Lessard-Phillips & Yaojun Li, 2017. "Social Stratification of Education by Ethnic Minority Groups over Generations in the UK," Social Inclusion, Cogitatio Press, vol. 5(1), pages 45-54.
    12. Basu Sukanya & Insler Michael, 2017. "Education Outcomes of Children of Asian Intermarriages: Does Gender of the Immigrant Parent Matter?," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 17(1), pages 1-21, February.
    13. Estrella Gualda, 2007. "Researching Second Generation in a Transitional, European, and Agricultural Context of Reception of Immigrants," Working Papers 332, Princeton University, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Center for Migration and Development..

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:asiaeu:v:10:y:2012:i:4:p:267-285. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.