Race into the twenty-first century: Introduction (Canadian writing)

The introduction situates the current debates about "race" in Canadian literary and cultural studies by tracing a brief history of the uses of "race" from the nation-building era through the midcentury period of liberal multiculturalism and onward to the turn-of-the-millennium resurgence of "race" in the form of literary and cultural institutions organized around racialized categories such as "Native Canadian," "Asian Canadian," and "African Canadian." The authors argue that, despite the dangers involved in the "return of race," the coalitional potential and assertive power of these categories make them an important part of the ongoing process of establishing the cultural productions of racialized people as important to Canadian culture generally.