Multiculture and Community in New City Spaces

Abstract

Convention suggests that multicultural areas tend to exhibit high levels of residential and educational segregation, high degrees of poverty and deprivation and low rates of contact between culturally distinct individuals and groups. By contrast, with the help of a case study of a fast growing English new town, this paper reflects on the experience of multicultural settlement in what might be described as an ordinary city: one in which that experience is relatively recent and whose identity is constantly in the process of being made and remade. It draws on qualitative research, based around semi-structured interviews, participant observation and the use of focus groups, to develop its conclusions. Moving beyond any notion that minority ethnic communities live ‘parallel lives’, the paper identifies and explores some of the ways in which the new city spaces of Milton Keynes are actively lived, negotiated and understood by the Ghanaian and Somali communities (and particularly by young people from those communities). It highlights the tensions between the ways in which difference is negotiated in practice and attempts to define communities through processes of governance.

Keywords:

• Community
• Diversity
• Multiculture
• New City Spaces
• Ordinary City
• Policy
• Urban Spaces
• Young People

Notes

1. Undertaken as part of an ESRC CASE studentship, in partnership with Milton Keynes Council, ESRC Reference No. ES/F033311/1.

2. A recently formed Ghanaian community group for those from the ‘Ewe’ ethnic group of Ghana.

3. A recently formed Ghanaian community group for those who have lived in Milton Keynes for over 10 years.

4. A recently formed Ghanaian community group made up primarily of those from the Akan ethnic group from the Ghanaian city of Kumasi.

5. A recently formed Ghanaian community group incorporating those who have migrated to Milton Keynes from Europe.

6. A recently formed Somali community group within Milton Keynes.

7. The Somali Community Council was established to bring all of the new Somali community groups together to promote unity and to speak with ‘one voice’.

8. A recently formed Somali community organisation, legally a Community Interest Company.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jamie Kesten

Jamie Kesten is currently completing a PhD in the Geography Department at the Open University. Jamie is a member of the Open Space Research Centre at the Open University

Allan Cochrane

Allan Cochrane is Professor of Urban Studies at the Open University. He is a member of the Open Space Research Centre at the Open University

Giles Mohan

Giles Mohan is Reader in the Politics of International Development at the Open University. He is a member of the Open Space Research Centre at the Open University

Sarah Neal

Sarah Neal is Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Social Sciences at the Open University. She is a member of the Open Space Research Centre at the Open University