Abstract
In the opening ceremony of the London 2012 Olympics, one segment of the event celebrated British popular music and culture through a focus on everyday suburban family life. The family at the centre of this sequence featured a Black father and White mother and their children — alongside what appeared to be other extended family members and friends — interacting happily at home and outside it. The prominence given to a mixedrace family and, in particular, their representation as a typical British family, was noted quite widely in media and public debate. The views of Diane Abbott, Britain’s first Black British female MP, celebrating the family’s inclusion — and the multicultural nature of the ceremony overall — as illustrative of ‘how far Britain has come in its attitude to race’1 were echoed in much of the largely positive public commentary. Much, but not all.
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© 2014 Chamion Caballero
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Caballero, C. (2014). Mixing Race in Britain: The Influence of Academic Publics. In: Taylor, Y. (eds) The Entrepreneurial University. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137275875_13
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137275875_13
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