Is the Discourse of Hybridity a Celebration of Mixing, or a Reformulation of Racial Division? A Multimodal Analysis of the Portuguese Magazine Afro

Authors

  • José Ricardo Carvalheiro Universidade da Beira Interior

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.17169/fqs-11.2.1487

Keywords:

"race", hybridity, discourse, image, post-colonial, minority media, gender

Abstract

For many years the study of "race" relations was dominated by paradigms—of assimilationism and multiculturalism—which highlighted difference and division (as a problem, or a virtue). In more recent years the idea of racial and cultural mixing—creolization or hybridization—has become an important concept in ethnic and racial studies. The starting point of this article is the observation that the idea of racial and cultural mixture—hybridity or mestiçagem—was a key ideological feature of Portuguese colonialism in its last decades. If hybridity is not therefore a new discourse in Portugal, what is the place for it today and what kind of hybridity is being referred to? What might the Portuguese case tell us about discourses of hybridity more generally? The article explores these questions through a combined visual and linguistic analysis of the lifestyle magazine Afro as a site where contemporary discourses about "race" intertwine. URN: urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs1002247

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Author Biography

José Ricardo Carvalheiro, Universidade da Beira Interior

José Ricardo CARVALHEIRO is Assistant Professor in the Communication and Arts Department of the University of Beira Interior, Portugal. His academic background is in sociology and media studies. He is interested in subjects relating to media, culture, migration and minorities.

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Published

2010-05-29

How to Cite

Carvalheiro, J. R. (2010). Is the Discourse of Hybridity a Celebration of Mixing, or a Reformulation of Racial Division? A Multimodal Analysis of the Portuguese Magazine Afro. Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 11(2). https://doi.org/10.17169/fqs-11.2.1487