ABSTRACT
THE FORM OF MULTICULTURALISM that most people are most familiar with in the West is probably the organized representation of cultural difference. Its favorite genre and emblem is the multiethnic parade, that is, a kind of stage show that, in its own jargon, “celebrates diversity.” Observing this kind of practice as a “Canadian institution,” Audrey Kobayashi (1993, 206) has coined the expression “‘red boots’ multiculturalism” which typically consists of “folk dancing, cultural festivals and ethnic restaurants.” The headlines are well known from almost any newspaper one chances to pick up: New Yorkers of fifty-two cultures join the Mayor’s Parade; Londoners of sixteen cultures enjoyed an evening of Chinese dancing; representatives of five cultures discussed the issue of women’s rights in Middletown. There is nothing wrong with such ventures; yet they represent not so much a pluralist multiculturalism as a difference “multi”- culturalism that parades the distinctiveness of each so-called cultural group and remains in thrall to each reified understanding of culture. Instead of breaking down cultural barriers, which is its chief claim, it has to reinscribe these cultural borders and fix them as if they were given by nature.
