Masquerade Politics: Explorations In The Structure Of Urban Cultural Movements - Hardcover

Cohen, Abner

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0854967982 ISBN 13: 9780854967988

Publisher: Berg Publishers, 1993

Synopsis

This study explores the dynamic relations between cultural forms and political formations in some urban cultural movements. The analysis is based on a detailed study of the structure and development of the London Notting Hill Carnival, widely described as Europe's biggest street festival. Started in 1966 as a small-scale, multi-ethnic local festival, it grew into a massive West-Indian dominated affair that over the years occasioned violent confrontations between black youth and the police. The carnival developed and mobilized a homogenous and communal West-Indian culture that helped in the struggle against rampant racism. The celebration is contrasted with other carnival movements, such as California's `Renaissance Pleasure Faire'. Analytically, this is a follow-up to Cohen's earlier studies of the relations between drama and politics in some urban religious, ethnic and elitist movements in Africa. The conclusion focuses on the processes underlying the transformation of rational political strategies into non-rational cultural forms.

About this title

About the Author

Abner Cohen Emeritus Professor of Anthropology SOAS, University of London

Edition details

• Publisher: Berg Publishers
• Publication date: 1993
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0854967982
• ISBN 13: 9780854967988
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 176