Multiculturalism and Human Affiliations

By: Stephen Ainsah-Mensah

You try to retrieve the pride and dignity that is rightly yours. You do so whenever you examine a multi-culture that is bound to you and is claimed to be yours. But you believe this is not your own authentic culture but a loose-fitting conglomeration of cultures. You feel that this kind of culture is not truly yours because it lacks the natural magnet to enliven your restless soul; so, you begin to sob in silence and act with a pained heart. Then, you ask yourself: “why is this dominant culture that directs the temper of the multi-culture not professing elements of kinship with me?” You continue: “am I a lost soul, a creature whose pathways in life lacks inward vitality?”

The moment you are told or see for yourself that studies in your missing subculture have begun - or will begin - in structured schools that connect to your, so far, bandied personality, you comprehend, for the first time, the idea of true liberation deep down your hitherto disquieted soul. That marks the beginning of your glorious empowerment freed from the impurities of an intrusive culture, disturbing to you at heart, but which you have superficially treasured. There and then, you say to yourself: “At last, my innate personality has been brought to light. I have, in the past, slept for so long in an alien encasement that was draped in darkness. I could see my way about alright, but I was confused as my sleeping and awakenings were not naturally connected.” So, your thoughts were darkened by the forces of inverted brilliance; your passions were equally dark, so too your dispositions. Now, you have begun a new vigorous life with a new light that knows no retreat, the light that embraces the natural forces of cultural identity set in a multi-culture that you, nevertheless, relish in principle. Now, you understand yourself and them, so you can fully integrate in a multi-culture without any tinge of gloom. If your true redemption can be seen by all and cherished in the true light of humanity, it is because your authentic personality is not merely natural but also economic, social and political. You assert: “observe my role in these three spheres, and you will see me as competitive as anybody else that you care to compliment unless you place in my way, without any justification, barriers that are dangerously unnatural.” You have redeemed yourself!

The above poetic narrative ought to awake in us a feeling of cultural family-hood; so one may go back to assess multiculturalism from the perspective of whether it encourages family-hood, not merely in principle but also in practice, in the realm of life, in particular, whereby advancing the course of the society entails giving fair room for all to animate personal identity via cultural identity. The tension that arises in multiculturalism is about how subculture members integrate yet degenerate, chiefly in social-economic matters. Problems such as these cause the edifice of multiculturalism to wobble. It may be asked: should subculture members be raised - or allowed to raise themselves – to the level of self-determination just like dominant culture members? Or, should subculture members be gauged according to their striking dissimilarities, in whichever form, in contradictory fashion to dominant culture members, thus stripping the former of the tendency to gain equality with the latter?

It is obvious that in applying the latter question, the fabric of multiculturalism gets eating up by some forces of non-cooperation from the side of subculture members to the extent that any previous expectation of the purification of multiculturalism gets postponed indefinitely until the time that the coalescence of dominant cultures and subcultures prevail; and this ideal condition is predictable in a civilization that experiences, with time, a proliferation of subcultures in the face of a receding dominant culture. Besides, this condition simply shows that the prevailing laws, mores, which are derived from the dominant culture, may not be sustainable - indefinitely.

But the conscious detachment of oneself despite the clarion call to serve one's nation as an incontestable duty must be rejected outright. There can be no excuse for a legitimate grumbler who refuses such a call on the grounds that his/her pressing needs as a subculture individual go unmet. This individual is promoting at such decisive moments untimely divisiveness. He/She is a bad example that must be halted at all cost. If not, the multicultural edifice could quake at surprising turns. And it seems likely that our deviant guy here is not the type that will be considered or viewed as a usual individual in a multicultural system. The system undergoes trials, challenges that are essential for it to finally liberate itself from concrete inconsistencies. Therefore, the retention of subcultures is entirely consistent with the expedient homogeneity of multiculturalism whenever the need arises - as it is, for example, in the case of having to save a nation from a danger. At this time, all individuals, irrespective of cultural affiliations, have to set aside their diverse cultural leanings while proving oneness in the framework of multiculturalism. And this is a special beauty of a multicultural civilization.