Conference Announcement "In the Plural: Divergence and Convergence in the Canadian Context" International Conference on Postcolonial Cultures Graduate School of Canadian Studies, Université de Toulouse Le Mirail Toulouse (France) 16-18 March 2006
Present-day Canada's culturally pluralistic society implies a variety of modes of expression and representation (on the linguistic, literay, artistic, political, historiographic, sociological... levels); over the years indeed, through the accretion of multiple divergent cultures, the Canadian nation was, and is still being, built: the Euro-Canadian culture of the two founding peoples (English and French) initially clashed with Native traditions; Euro-centric society was then gradually destabilized, if not superseded, by successive waves of immigrants from all over the world. Canada's multicultural situation raises many questions to be discussed in our conference: to which extent is there a possible convergence between the original models (the orality of Natives, the Euro-centrism of French and English modes of thinking and writing), and the others imported from Asia, the West Indies, Africa.)? The role of the multiculturalist policies implemented in the 1960s will be considered as well as the limits of this state-imposed pluralism. Should a recentring be called for, eventually leading to a degree of homogeneization and assimilation to a mainstream mode of thinking and writing? Or, on the contrary, should difference, exposed by Canadian pluralism, be freely asserted and seen as a dynamic construction through cross-cultural interactions, as an ongoing process not only compatible with but beneficial to the social, economic, political, literary, artistic evolution of Canada? Thus making divergence one of the major assets of the latter. Contact: Michèle Kaltemback Etudes canadiennes Université de Toulouse Le Mirail Email: [email protected] _________________________________ InterPhil List Administration: http://interphil.polylog.org/ Intercultural Philosophy Calendar: http://agd.polylog.org/cal/
