NEW MIGRANT EUROPE: EVIDENCE FROM THE CLASSROOM
New migrant Europe: evidence from the classroom

Summary/Abstract: The Council of Europe’s 2011 “Report of the Group of Eminent Persons,” titled “Living Together: Combining diversity and freedom in 21st-century Europe,” continues the long-standing practice of asking what the relatively new European federation can learn from the United States of America’s experience with immigration and ethnic minorities. As in both the EU and the US political capital is to be accrued once again by voicing radical positions pro or against the free movement of persons, it becomes imperative that we interrogate the heuristic relevance of such comparisons and particularly the appropriateness of the assumption that Europe should learn from the US’s past experiences. This article analyses pedagogic practice in the disciplines of American Studies and Contemporary American Literature for evidence of gaps between the discourse of cultural and literary studies and deeply ingrained bias regarding cultural practice in 21st-century Europe. Rather than draw conclusions, it raises a number of questions concerning the current discourse of identity.

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