Multiculturalism

Abstract

Over the past century, multiculturalism has risen in importance around the globe, and more people than ever before in human history now live in multicultural environments. Migrants, what Pico Iyer calls the ‘Floating Tribe’, will soon outnumber Americans (Iyer, 2013). As a result, there have been waves of interest in how to foster multiculturalism, what its impacts are, and what the obstacles are for multicultural communities living in egalitarian peace. The largest body of literature on multicultural interactions focuses on immigrants entering Western countries, primarily in Europe or North America. However, some literature has begun to examine multiculturalism from other standpoints, including minority populations already existing within the dominant culture. The reported benefits of multiculturalism for cognitive abilities will be summarised, and, finally, various theoretical perspectives are employed to understand multicultural dynamics. This includes intergroup contact, social dominance orientation, identity theories, and clinical perspectives such as psychoanalytic theory.