Howarth, Caroline, Wagner, Wolfgang, Magnusson, Nicola and Sammut, Gordon (2013) ‘It’s only other people who make me feel black’: acculturation, identity and agency in a multicultural community. Political psychology . ISSN 0162-895X (In Press)
Abstract
This paper explores identity work and acculturation work in the lives of British mixed-heritage children and adults. Children, teenagers and parents with mixed-heritage participated in a community arts project that invited them to deliberate, construct and reconstruct their cultural identities and cultural relations. We found that acculturation, cultural and raced identities are constructed through a series of oppositional themes: cultural maintenance versus cultural contact; identity as inclusion versus identity as exclusion; institutionalised ideologies versus agency. The findings point towards an understanding of acculturation as a dynamic, situated and multifaceted process: acculturation in movement. To investigate this, we argue that acculturation research needs to develop a more dynamic and situated approach to the study of identity, representation and culture. The paper concludes with a discussion on the need for political psychologists to develop methods attuned to the tensions and politics of acculturation that are capable of highlighting the possibilities for resistance and social change.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Official URL: | http://eu.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-... |
| Additional Information: | © 2013 International Society of Political Psychology |
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | acculturation, identity, social representations, culture, multiculture, qualitative methodology |
| Library of Congress subject classification: | B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BF Psychology H Social Sciences > HT Communities. Classes. Races |
| Sets: | Departments > Social Psychology |
| Rights: | http://www.lse.ac.uk/library/rights/LSERO.htm |
| URL: | http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/44193/ |
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