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Title: America's Banquet of Cultures: Harnessing Ethnicity, Race, and Immigration in the Twenty-First Century by Ronald Fernandez ISBN: 0-275-97508-8 Publisher: Praeger Paperback Pub. Date: 30 July, 2001 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $26.95

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Average Customer Rating: 5 (1 review)

Rating: 5
Summary: Revisiting race, color and immigration
Comment: Ronald Fernández's in-depth critical study about the hot button issues of race and immigration is a veritable gold mine of information for scholars and general readers. From the title itself, it is noticeable that Fernández wants to offer us an unique and versatile perspective. Rather than repeating the most common term of "melting pot", he employs "the banquet" which implies substantial meanings: celebration, camaraderie, dialogue and respect around the variety of food served in a communal table. In that sense "the banquet" is the representation of the social interaction in a common space: the United States of America. Fernández brings us intriguing and extraordinary facts and experiences, e.g., from the archives of presidents' libraries, to illustrate how paradoxical the incessant conception of race has been spread: from the people who have exercised the political power to the ordinary population. His critique of the USA society intends to deconstruct (or dismantle) the absurd dichotomy between splendorous whiteness and dull blackness. Fernández offers with numerous examples a vivid picture that the concept of color is questionable and untenable. The idea of race based on skin color is so laden with contradictions that it not longer works. As an example, he makes a pointed remark about the multiple variations of colors of the large group of immigrants - Asians, Dominicans, Puerto Ricans, Haitians, Filipinos and Mexicans - that do not find themselves within this category. It is in this spirit that Fernández has conceived the title of this book: America's Banquet of cultures. He invites us to be reflective since we live in a country that has not exactly created sensitivity and stability for the transnational immigrants, such as: Filipina maids, Mexicans farm laborers, Chinese sweatshop workers, among many others, who are displaced not only within the borders of this nation but also across the United States. Fernández persuasively stated, that the immigrants through many years have brought a complex realignment of social forces that engender an intense economic movement and cultural interdependency. Therefore, the term banquet, based on Fernández demands, refers to the sharing of our human common values and principles and develops honest awareness for our differences. Like all of Fernández' work this is a remarkable critical account in a sociological, historical, cultural and moral sense. This is a valuable work, analytical but very warm and witty. This is a book that everyone should read.