Cinematic city of cultural coexistence? : Perspectives on intercultural encounters in New York

Abstract

The paper examines how U.S.-American movies stage and convey intercultural encounters. Drawing from the case study of cinematic New York City, it tackles intercultural encounters and spaces emerging from interactions of protagonists that are staged as being ‘culturally different’. Theoretical ideas on urban encounters, interculturality, and boundaries are intertwined. A comparative analysis 17 movies reveals three key dimensions of intercultural spaces: boundary drawing, boundary crossing, and boundary commuting. As polysemous staging strategies these provide insight into how movies display everyday intercultural encounters in an urban context. The paper concludes that New York City is imagined as a place in which intercultural encounters are consciously reflected as cultural coexistence—the cinematic city serves as canvas for a culturally separated society. This finding disenchants the medially widespread urban myth of New York City being a harmonious intercultural metropolis.