Arguing that Canada's multicultural policies are propelled by a fantasy of unity rooted in a European drive to control diversity, Day suggests that state intervention can never bring an end to tensions related to ethnocultural relations of power.

With over 20 percent of the population foreign-born, and with more than 250 ethnic origins, Canada is one of the world's most multicultural societies. Canada's ethnic and religious diversity continues to grow alongside immigration. Yet how well is Canada's model of multiculturalism and citizenship working, and how well are Canadians, whatever their ethnic or religious origin, doing? Will Canada's relative success compared to other countries continue, or are there emerging fault lines in Canadian society? Canadian Multiculturalism: Evidence and Anecdote undertakes an extensive review of the available data from Statistics Canada, Citizenship and Immigration Canada operational statistics, employment equity and other sources to answer these questions and provide an integrated view covering economic outcomes, social indicators, and political and public service participation. Over 200 charts and tables are used to engage readers and substantiate the changing nature of Canadian diversity.

Canada's policy of multiculturalism has been the object of ongoing debate since it was first introduced in 1971. Decades later, Canadians still seem uncertain about the meaning of multiculturalism. Detractors insist that government has not succeeded in discouraging immigrants and their descendants from preserving their cultures of origin, undercutting a necessary identification with Canada, while supporters argue that immigrant groups' abilities to influence their adjustments to Canada has strengthened their sense of belonging. Beyond what often seems to be a polarized debate is a broad spectrum of opinion around multiculturalism in Canada and what it means to be Canadian. The Multiculturalism Question analyzes the policy, ideology, and message of multiculturalism. Several of Canada's leading thinkers provide valuable insights into a crucial debate that will inevitably continue well into the future.

Canada is often considered a multicultural mosaic, welcoming to immigrants and encouraging of cultural diversity. Yet this reputation masks a more complex history. In this groundbreaking study of the pre-history of Canadian multiculturalism, Daniel Meister shows how the philosophy of cultural pluralism normalized racism and the entrenchment of whiteness. The Racial Mosaic demonstrates how early ideas about cultural diversity in Canada were founded upon, and coexisted with, settler colonialism and racism, despite the apparent tolerance of a variety of immigrant peoples and their cultures. To trace the development of these ideas, Meister takes a biographical approach, examining the lives and work of three influential public intellectuals whose thoughts on cultural pluralism circulated widely beginning in the 1920s: Watson Kirkconnell, a university professor and translator; Robert England, an immigration expert with Canadian National Railways; and John Murray Gibbon, a publicist for the Canadian Pacific Railway. While they all proposed variants of the idea that immigrants to Canada should be allowed to retain certain aspects of their cultures, their tolerance had very real limits. In their personal, corporate, and government-sponsored works, only the cultures of "white" European immigrants were considered worthy of inclusion. On the fiftieth anniversary of Canada's official policy of multiculturalism, The Racial Mosaic represents the first serious and sustained attempt to detail the policy's historical antecedents, compelling readers to consider how racism has structured Canada's settler-colonial society.

Multiculturalism is often thought to be defined by its commitment to diversity, inclusivity, sensitivity, and tolerance, but these established values sometimes require contrary practices of homogenization, exclusion, insensitivity, and intolerance. Multiculturalism in Canada clarifies what multiculturalism is by relating it to more basic principles of equality, freedom, recognition, authenticity, and openness. Forbes places both official Canadian multiculturalism and Quebec's semi-official interculturalism in their historical and constitutional setting, examines their relations to liberal democratic core values, and outlines a variety of practical measures that would make Canada a more open country and a better illustration of what a commitment to egalitarian cultural pluralism now means. Consisting of a series of connected essays-including careful considerations of the works of Will Kymlicka and Charles Taylor-this book provides the first comprehensive account of multiculturalism in Canada.

Acculturation is the process of group and individual changes in culture and behaviour that result from intercultural contact. These changes have been taking place forever, and continue at an increasing pace as more and more peoples of different cultures move, meet and interact. Variations in the meanings of the concept, and some systematic conceptualisations of it are presented. This is followed by a survey of empirical work with indigenous, immigrant and ethnocultural peoples around the globe that employed both ethnographic (qualitative) and psychological (quantitative) methods. This wide-ranging research has been undertaken in a quest for possible general principles (or universals) of acculturation. This Element concludes with a short evaluation of the field of acculturation; its past, present and future.

Canada has often been cited internationally for its success as a multicultural society and for its ability to manage this diversity through a federal constitution. The strands of diversity include the constitutional relationship between English and French Canada, federalism more generally, the status of Aboriginal peoples, Canada’s immigration and integration strategies, affirmative action, and a general guarantee of equal protection for men and women. Together they tell a complex story of pluralism, consolidated through a long and incremental period of constitution-building. Multiculturalism and the Canadian Constitution brings together scholars of cultural diversity from backgrounds in law, political science, and history to address key components of the changing Canadian story: the evolution over time of multiculturalism within Canadian constitutional law and policy; the territorial dimension of Canadian federalism; and the role of constitutional interpretation by the courts in the development of Canada as a multicultural state. Wide-ranging and provocative, the essays illustrate how deeply multiculturalism is woven into the fabric of the Canadian constitution and the everyday lives of Canadians.

Canada’s history, since its birth as a nation one hundred and fifty years ago, is one of immigration, nation-building, and contested racial and ethnic relations. In Immigration, Racial and Ethnic Studies in 150 Years of Canada: Retrospects and Prospects scholars provide a wide-ranging overview of this history with a core theme being one of enduring racial and ethnic conflict and inequality. The volume is organized around four themes where in each theme selected racial and ethnic issues are examined critically. Part 1 focuses on the history of Canadian immigration and nation-building while Part 2 looks at situating contemporary Canada in terms of the debates in the literature on ethnicity and race. Part 3 revisits specific racial and ethnic studies in Canada and finally in Part 4 a state-of-the-art is provided on immigration and racial and ethnic studies while providing prospects for the future. Contributors are: Victor Armony, David Este, Augie Fleras, Peter R. Grant, Shibao Guo, Abdolmohammad Kazemipur, Anne-Marie Livingstone, Adina Madularea, Ayesha Mian Akram, Nilum Panesar, Yolande Pottie-Sherman, Paul Pritchard, Howard Ramos, Daniel W. Robertson, Vic Satzewich, Morton Weinfeld, Rima Wilkes, Lori Wilkinson, Elke Winter, Nelson Wiseman, Lloyd Wong, and Henry Yu.

Ten essays on multiculturalism form a comprehensive picture of the problems and prospects of pluralism and mirror the nuanced issues which arise when theories and goals of cultural sensitivity confront real life.

In the 1950s and 1960s, immigration bureaucrats in the Department of Citizenship and Immigration played an important yet unacknowledged role in transforming Canada’s immigration policy. In response to external economic and political pressures for change, high-level bureaucrats developed new admissions criteria gradually and experimentally while personally processing thousands of individual immigration cases per year. Making Middle-Class Multiculturalism shows how bureaucrats’ perceptions and judgements about the admissibility of individuals – in socioeconomic, racial, and moral terms – influenced the creation of formal admissions criteria for skilled workers and family immigrants that continue to shape immigration to Canada. A qualitative content analysis of archival documents, conducted through the theoretical lens of a cultural sociology of immigration policy, reveals that bureaucrats’ interpretations of immigration files generated selection criteria emphasizing not just economic utility, but also middle-class traits and values such as wealth accumulation, educational attainment, entrepreneurial spirit, resourcefulness, and a strong work ethic. By making "middle-class multiculturalism" a demographic reality and basis of nation-building in Canada, these state actors created a much-admired approach to managing racial diversity that has nevertheless generated significant social inequalities.