ABSTRACT
In December 1995, the book review page of The Globe and Mail announced, ‘Political tomes reflect national malaise: Pundits zero in on issues clouding Canada’s identity’. Thomas Walkom’s review of nine recently published books about Canadian issues of identity begins by declaring that ‘Canada is in crisis’ (Walkom 1995). The sheer number of books produced on Canadian identity indicate that ‘problems’ and ‘crises’ of identity-and demands for solutions to such problems-are persistent features of life in Canada. Increasingly, however, writers who see cultural pluralism as the source of Canada’s identity problems are being granted legitimacy. Both Neil Bissoondath’s Selling Illusions: The Cult of Multiculturalism in Canada (1994), and Richard Gwyn’s Nationalism Without Walls proclaim that multiculturalism weakens national identity. Gwyn argues that if Canada continues to laud the cultures of others-meanwhile discarding the British Canadian symbols that have historically defined the nation —the nation is in danger, because if the core element of Canada is obliterated, there may be nothing left (Simpson 1995). Although there is in reality no imminent risk of this ‘obliteration’ occurring, the sense of impending ‘crisis’ gives these arguments for the defence of ‘core culture’ (and one might say the obliteration of multiculturalism) a sense of urgent necessity and increasing legitimacy.
