Conviviality loses its political force when equated with everyday multiculture

Evidence

Wise and Noble, in the introduction to their 2016 special issue ‘Conviviality’, in the Journal of Intercultural Studies, follow Nowicka and Vertovec by positioning Gilroy’s work in relation to a wider set of sociological concerns. They suggest that ‘this recent manifestation is part of an older and broader concern with the ongoing question of how communities/cultures/societies/nations “stick together”’ (p. 423). They cite Durkheim’s work ‘positive solidarity’, and argue that conviviality ‘is one among several zeitgeist terms aimed at conceptualising aspects of lived multiculture: everyday multiculturalism, everyday cosmopolitanism, everyday racism, superdiversity, migrant urbanisms’ (pp. 427–428). Again, while discussing cognate terms is hardly problematic – words and concepts are not discrete and nor should they be – something vital is lost when conviviality, as Gilroy formulates it, blurs into other terms that lack the same analytical depth and political bite. As I have argued, conviviality is only important because it plays out in the context of racism, ultra-nationalism, perpetual war, widening social inequality and deepening social insecurity. After Empire is filled with references to Guantanamo Bay, the failures of the left, and problems with neoliberalism, consumerism and securitocracy, none of which find their way into the ‘everyday multiculture’ literature which so easily translates conviviality into its synonyms. — Luke de Noronha, The conviviality of the overpoliced,…, 22

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies that Gilroy’s conviviality is not synonymous with ‘everyday multiculture’ or ‘everyday cosmopolitanism’ — it is only meaningful against racism, war, and inequality.
• XREF: Connects to debates about conceptual ‘travel’ and dilution of critical terms, echoing how terms get domesticated when exported across literatures. — connects to: Everyday convivial interaction makes ethno-national identity politically obsolete as a category of belonging. — Sivamohan Valluvan, Conviviality and Multiculture: A…, 38; Conviviality theory loses critical force when divorced from state racism and hierarchy. — Luke de Noronha, The conviviality of the overpoliced,…, 5; Conviviality gains political urgency precisely where multicultural daily life is most constrained. — Luke de Noronha, The conviviality of the overpoliced,…, 54 (+1 more)
• corroborated: 4 independent passages support this claim — Luke de Noronha, The conviviality of the overpoliced,…, 22

Related

• Everyday convivial interaction makes ethno-national identity politically obsolete as a category of belonging. (similarity 0.87)
• Conviviality gains political urgency precisely where multicultural daily life is most constrained. (similarity 0.83)
• Conviviality theory loses critical force when divorced from state racism and hierarchy. (similarity 0.82)
• Gilroy’s conviviality means ease with diversity without reasserting fixed ethnic identities. (similarity 0.80)
• Conviviality matters only as care against racist structures. (similarity 0.79)
• Everyday cohabitation differs in kind from multiculturalism’s model of distinct groups. (similarity 0.78)