Messy Multiculturalism - A critical conversation about state multiculturalism and the lived everyday experiences of cultural diversity in Aotearoa New Zealand.

Abstract

This thesis provides an ethnographic study of multiculturalism in Aotearoa New Zealand, which investigates the tensions between government-led stories about social harmony and tolerance and the stories told by members of multicultural communities. Examining multiculturalism from an ethnographic perspective means attempting to understand this concept through the fragmented, multiform, non-systematic, evocative and constantly changing reality of social life and everyday human interactions. Essentially, this means exploring the sometimes ‘messy’ experiences of multiculturalism. The thesis is based on a narrative approach to ethnographic fieldwork, which involves the application of auto-ethnography, semi-structured interviews, participant observation, and document analysis as different avenues for story collection and analysis. I position myself as an academic listener, who makes sense of stories about multiculturalism by placing them alongside other types of stories and organising them through life-story and discourse analysis approaches. Through extensive Wellington-based fieldwork with grassroots organisations, everyday diversity experts, and multicultural activists, as well as discourse analysis of various forms of government publications and materials (i.e. conference speeches, booklets, reports, guidelines and photos), I gather evidence that reveals the complexities of multicultural identities when contrasted with government discourses of multiculturalism. I assemble and analyse two sets of stories – those told by government officials and representatives and those that emerge from the messy landscape of everyday life and grassroots multicultural movements. The key aim of this thesis is to stage a conversation between these different narrative terrains and shine a light on the disjunctive moments between government narratives about cultural diversity and the experiences, needs and aspirations of people who live multicultural lives and who engage in grassroots activism. In analysing the evidence, this thesis reveals the complex ways in which people that live multicultural lives experience cultural belonging, and documents how they deploy strategic and creative techniques to navigate government-based forms of multiculturalism. My findings suggest that stories told from those who are a part of Aotearoa’s culturally diverse communities pose challenges to the official and government led image of New Zealand as a harmonious, tolerant and welcoming nation. By applying a narrative approach to the exploration of information distributed by the government, I demonstrate how this kind of information is discursively constructed and contributes to a larger storytelling project in which state information works to craft a particular image of the nation. In the conversation that is staged throughout the thesis, it is argued that the government appears to support a weak version of multiculturalism, which only allows a tokenistic inclusion of ethnic minorities. The kind of multiculturalism which is aspired to from the ground – that is, by the everyday diversity experts and grassroots activists I interviewed during fieldwork – imagines a stronger version of multiculturalism. This version includes more radical forms of inclusion such as ethnic minorities being involved in decision making processes and being fairly represented in governing/public spaces, such as government agencies, local councils, school boards, law enforcement, legal institutions, and so on. Overall, this thesis contributes site specific and narrative-informed knowledge about the meaning of multiculturalism in New Zealand. It illustrates some of the factors that the government and policy makers need to be mindful of when they approach a multicultural population and matters of governance. It also exemplifies the kind of conversation topics and issues that are important and necessary to address in a multicultural settler society, when reflecting on how we understand and express the histories of cultural diversity and aspirations for a multicultural future.