After more than forty years of discussion, research and policies aimed at migrants, their children and their grandchildren, it is high time for a book focusing on a group that has been overlooked in the integration debate: people without a migration background. In many major European cities, this group has become a numerical minority. How do they experience today’s superdiverse cities? How do they engage with diversity? These questions were answered in the international Becoming a Minority (BaM) research. An important outcome was that people without a migration background generally see living in an ethnically diverse city as enriching but very few have ethnically mixed friendship groups. Many members of this new minority group have not learnt to ‘do diversity’ from an early age. This book shows that people who have mastered the art of living together in diversity have more social contacts and enjoyable interactions, resulting in a greater sense of belonging in the superdiverse city. Participating in your diverse surrounding appears to be good for your own well-being.
Maurice Crul is a distinguished professor of Sociology at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam. He is a specialist on school and labour market careers of children of immigrants and refugees in Europe and the United States. He presently is coordinating an ERC advanced grant project with the acronym BAM (Becoming a Minority) that looks at the new minority in superdiverse cities: the people without migration background living in majority minority neighborhoods. He has written more than a hundred journal and chapter articles about issues of diversity and inclusion. Some of his books include: The New Face of World Cities (Russell Sage Foundation Publishers), Coming to Terms with Superdiversity. The Case of Rotterdam (Springer Press), Superdiversity. A New Vision on Integration (Free University Press) and New Social Mobility. Second Generation Pioneers in Europe (Springer Press). The book can be downloaded for free.
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