Informality and cosmopolitanism in people’s lives. The case of an African restaurant

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2018-11-29

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en

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This Master Thesis is about how informality and cosmopolitanism are entangled in the everyday life of people who share a specific place, in this case, an African restaurant in The Netherlands. The mainstream definition of both concepts is questioned and six different dimensions, three of each concept (informality/cosmopolitanism), are described as the theoretical framework. Through those lenses, the everyday routine of the restaurant is used as a social laboratory where to observe how intercultural encounters work out, how informality binds people together and how relations among different identities build the definition of the restaurant. In conclusion, informality and cosmopolitanism are used with a positive and constructive connotation that move the discussion from the burden to actually the advantage that brings multicultural environments. This research highlights the direct relation between informality and cosmopolitanism and makes it a matter of the everyday life, uncovering relations of power, the struggle among the construction of identities, and at the end, the use of spaces that being local have global questions embedded. This Master Thesis also brings a more dynamic and interactive form to explore the results, in a website (www.informalandcosmopolitan.com). Key concepts: informality, cosmopolitanism, African restaurant, normativity, power relations, identity, emotionality, mobility, encounters.

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Faculteit der Managementwetenschappen