Conviviality and Multicultural Urban Experiences
Summary
Conviviality in the urban context refers to the everyday practices and interactions through which people of diverse backgrounds live together, negotiate difference and construct shared social environments. Rooted in debates on multiculturalism, conviviality emphasises informal encounters, reciprocal respect and the co-production of public life rather than formal policy or celebratory diversity events. Research in this field spans ethnographic studies of community cafés and public libraries to spatial analyses of community-initiated green spaces and recreational sites. These studies reveal how neighbourhoods, public furniture, roadside gardens and shared rituals can become loci for both inclusion and contestation. Across global cities—from post-colonial capitals to deindustrialised towns—scholars are uncovering the micro-practices that foster solidarity, expose structural inequalities and shape citizens’ sense of belonging. Practical applications include urban planning strategies that recognise informal public gardening as a climate-resilient intervention, library programming that foregrounds everyday crafts as sites of intercultural recognition and policy frameworks that value minor encounters alongside formal civic initiatives. By foregrounding mundane interactions, this body of work offers a grounded perspective on how difference is lived, mediated and transformed in contemporary urban life.
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Conviviality and Multicultural Urban Experiences publication trend
The graph below shows the total number of articles in conviviality and multicultural urban experiences across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).
Technical terms
Conviviality: The capacity to live together across cultural, ethnic and social differences through everyday interactions and practices.
Everyday multiculturalism: The routine expressions of cultural diversity in ordinary urban spaces, outside formal policy or event-based frameworks.
Superdiversity: Urban contexts characterised by a high density of multiple, intersecting cultural, linguistic and ethnic backgrounds.
Convivial greenstreets: Informal, resident-initiated streetside gardening activities that foster social ties, ecological services and microclimatic benefits.
References
- Conviviality and its others: for a plural politics of living with difference. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies (2022).
- Spatial Indices for Convivial Greenstreets. Sustainability (2023).
- Everyday Multiculturalism in the Public Library: Taking Knitting Together Seriously. Sociology (2020).
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