ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces the conceptual linkages between cosmopolitanism and cities and considers scholarship that explicates the capacity and potential of cities to generate new opportunities for contact, interaction and mutual learning among its dwellers and communities. It focuses on contemplate the uneven manifestations of cosmopolitanism in everyday urban reality and discusses issues with the discursive and managerial approach that cities adopt to market themselves as multicultural models for emulation. The speciousness of cosmopolitanism as a peculiarity of all cities becomes especially salient when one considers the persistent tensions of everyday urban life. Fixating on the urban sphere alone harbours the risk of blindsiding researchers to the prospect that cosmopolitanism can sometimes take on more compelling and intimate forms outside the context of the city. For cities struggling still to reconcile opposing factions dwelling in their midst, learning from these rural and small town examples may very well be the beginning of their forging a more cohesive and cosmopolitan society.
