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rfmcdonaldBy now I'd expect, most of you will have read New York Times' "The High Cost of Being a Gay Couple". This article, detailing how same-sex couples suffer financially compared to opposite-sex couples since the US federal government doesn't recognize their marriages, whatever individual states do, is a fairly compelling read, not least because of the numerous parallels with other officially disapproved couples. There are any number of bigots opposed to intermarriage because it'll damage the cultural integrity of the children, and more who oppose unfortunate couplings because they're visit apocalypses on an unwisely approving society, and many more hostile to the idea just because it's icky. Whether it's Danes marrying disfavoured non-EU citizens, Lebanese clerics who want to keep the different breeds of Christians and Muslims separate for their own good (who's "their"? good question), or Israelis who can't get married to people of different religious backgrounds without either frequently demeaning conversions or leaving the country, these couples definitely illustrate the boundaries of what their societies consider to be violations of basic boundaries. If you look at historical examples, like bans on black/white marriage in the United States (for example) or the apartheid-era ban on interracial marriage in South Africa, it's easy to recognize that marriage laws say quite a lot about a particular polity.
Of course intermarriage isn't the only kind of boundary violation out there. In a Financial Times article ("Immigrant Muslims in Belleville", 2 October 2009), Simon Kuper makes the point that French Muslims, far from constituting an irreconcilably foreign body bound to create Eurabia, actually are fairly well integrated into French society and are being changed by France rather more than they are changing their homeland.
The problem is that too many French Muslims are stuck in relatively isolated suburban housing projects, and that many of those who aren't find it exceptionally difficult to get past discrimination on the job markets. One sort of boundary--the idea that French Muslims are legitimate members of French society--has been crossed. Another boundary, their full integration into French society on the same terms as everyone else, remains to be crossed.
What are my culture's inviolable boundaries? I suppose that, as in France, it's the idea that immigrants are rapidly and fully assimilated into their new society. Another might be the idea that multiculturalism, far from ghettoizing immigrants by dividing them into static ethnic groups, is a way to integrate immigrants. Yet another might be violating the belief, done more frequently now than before, that Canada has nothing to learn from the Americans, and another--a specifically English Canadian one, here--might be contradicting the belief that English Canada has always represented Québec fairly and that this province is in fact full of bigots unlike the rest of Canada. As for the question of the couplings I mentioned above, well, Canada has improved significantly, but . . .
What are your culture's inviolable boundaries>
Of course intermarriage isn't the only kind of boundary violation out there. In a Financial Times article ("Immigrant Muslims in Belleville", 2 October 2009), Simon Kuper makes the point that French Muslims, far from constituting an irreconcilably foreign body bound to create Eurabia, actually are fairly well integrated into French society and are being changed by France rather more than they are changing their homeland.
Anyone wanting to understand the situation of Muslims in Europe should visit Belleville. The rundown Parisian neighbourhood just east of the city centre is packed with couscous restaurants, Islamic bookshops and French citizens of Arab origin. About 1.5 million nominal Muslims live in the Paris region, more than in any other European city.
But the narrow streets of Belleville are also packed with people of Chinese, Jewish, sub-Saharan African and middle-class French origin. A class of children pours out of a kindergarten: toddlers of four different colours hold hands while their teachers issue commands in French.
The Moroccan novelist Abdellah Taïa lives in the Belleville building on whose steps, according to legend, Edith Piaf was born. (In truth, “The Little Sparrow” was born in a local hospital.) “I’m even overjoyed to go to McDonald’s,” says Taïa, as he pours a version of Moroccan mint tea reinvented by a posh French tea house. “The servers are white, black, Arab, Chinese. It’s almost too philosophical-existential an experience, to see this mélange”. On Taïa’s street, the vagrants are French, Algerian and Portuguese. There is a café for white creative types run by Arabs and frequented in the mornings by Chinese businessmen. By the metro around the corner, older Arab men consort with Chinese prostitutes.
The problem is that too many French Muslims are stuck in relatively isolated suburban housing projects, and that many of those who aren't find it exceptionally difficult to get past discrimination on the job markets. One sort of boundary--the idea that French Muslims are legitimate members of French society--has been crossed. Another boundary, their full integration into French society on the same terms as everyone else, remains to be crossed.
What are my culture's inviolable boundaries? I suppose that, as in France, it's the idea that immigrants are rapidly and fully assimilated into their new society. Another might be the idea that multiculturalism, far from ghettoizing immigrants by dividing them into static ethnic groups, is a way to integrate immigrants. Yet another might be violating the belief, done more frequently now than before, that Canada has nothing to learn from the Americans, and another--a specifically English Canadian one, here--might be contradicting the belief that English Canada has always represented Québec fairly and that this province is in fact full of bigots unlike the rest of Canada. As for the question of the couplings I mentioned above, well, Canada has improved significantly, but . . .
What are your culture's inviolable boundaries>
