Abstract
Both in academia and in the public debate, critics of multiculturalist theorists frequently accuse them of freezing cultural minority groups' affinities, ossifying social bounds, and essentializing minorities. However, these accusations are often directed at multiculturalism, as if the term referred to a theoretical trend with a homogeneous conception. This paper aims to discuss the validity of such criticism, focusing on three of this theoretical trend's most recognized authors: Will Kymlicka, Iris Marion Young, and Bhikhu Parekh. We argue that those authors indeed essentialize cultural identities, but each one for different reasons. To show that, we reproduce Anne Phillips's typology of forms of essentialism to identify the essentialist and anti-essentialist traces in each of these authors' texts. We argue that the debate about the limits of multiculturalism will hardly move forward until anti-essentialist critics perceive the different types of essentialization presented in these authors' works.
Keywords:
multiculturalism; essentialism; culture; identity; recognition