Race in Translation: Culture Wars Around the Postcolonial Atlantic Book

While the term "culture wars" often designates the heated arguments in the English-speaking world spiralling around race, the canon, and affirmative action, in fact these discussions have raged in multiple sites and languages. Charting the multidirectional traffic of the debates, Stam/Shohat trace their literal and figurative translation, seen in French Postcolonial Studies and Brazilian Whiteness Studies, and in such cultural phenomena as Tropicalia and Hip-Hop. The authors also interrogate an ironic convergence whereby rightist politicians join hands with leftist intellectuals, along with the Neo-Cons and Nouveaux Philosophes, in condemning the "spectre" of multiculturalism and identity politics. At once a report from various "fronts," a mapping of the germane literatures, and an argument about cross-border comparison and interlocution, the book constitutes a major contribution to our understanding of the diasporic and transnational movement of ideas.Read More