ABSTRACT
In recent years, academic writing on issues of race and identity has been characterised by a preoccupation with notions of change. Echoing wider debates in social theory, the talk has been about the accelerating experiences of postmodernity and globalisation, with their attendant formations of hybridity, fragmentation, performative identities and strategic essentialisms – and, in many ways, these terms have helped to illuminate contemporary events. Clearly, there are changes in the shape of our world and in our relations to each other – no one doubts the significance of globalising capital in all our lives. However, this exclusive focus on the shifting determinants of identity formation has distracted from more everyday and less glamorous issues.
