%0 Journal Article
%T Challenging the Cultural Mosaic: Shani Mootoo's "Out on Main Street"
%A Schneider
%A Sebastian
%J COPAS : Current Objectives of Postgraduate American Studies
%D 2008
%I University of Regensburg
%X The essay examines the short story ¡°Out on Main Street¡± (1993) by Caribbean-Canadian author Shani Mootoo as an example of fictional contestations of the official policy of multiculturalism in Canada, which has been a major discourse in the realm of cultural affairs in Canada since the Canadian Multiculturalism Act of 1988. Canadian multiculturalism is often critiqued as a token policy aiming at keeping non-¡®white¡¯ Canadians from the ¡®white¡¯ cultural center of Canadian society. The discourse of multiculturalism is often conceptualized by the spatial metaphor of the mosaic and thus implies rigid boundaries, in this case between ethno-cultural groups. Mootoo is read here as one among many contemporary non-¡®white¡¯ Canadian authors of fiction that draft alternative spatial orders to the cultural mosaic in their texts and thus offer ways of imagining Canadian society differently.
%U http://copas.uni-regensburg.de/article/view/105/129