Mosaics, Diversity and What to Make of it All

I had something quite different in mind for the March edition of Random Riffs, but CBC changed all that. Last week the Metro Morning radio program ran a series entitled "Toronto's Mosaic: A Reality Check." It began as follows: "Integration has it's challenges. As the population of Toronto becomes increasingly diverse, so too do the ways the cultures interact - but it's interaction that clearly comes with challenges." It doesn't take much to get me sidetracked!

There could be no genuine criticism if they stopped quarreling, because criticism can be practiced only by free agents whose conclusions depend on perceptions, feelings, and thoughts that can never come in a single mold. In most matters of complex judgment we in fact must mistrust uniformity of opinion; it surely results not from reason but from coercion, idolatry, or laziness.

Wayne C. Booth

The conversation grew more animated, on the tower of Babel, the moment when the confusion of tongues was imposed. But would anyone say that critical vitality was thereby increased?

Anon

Diversity, we say, is a good thing. Better to foster variety in thought and opinion than try to subdue it. Political parties are “big tents” willing and able to accommodate and be enriched by a broad range of special interests; pluralistic communities are “mosaics” (a favorite of Canadians) and a good breeding ground for a tolerant citizenry; governing boards of publicly-funded institutions are more effective if they represent all stakeholders rather than a few; and if you’re a professional service firm, it’s a good thing if you can call yourself “multidisciplinary”.

Our rhetoric is all on the side of diversity. But it is an incautious rhetoric and when we consult our experience we are put in mind of T.S. Eliot’s The Hollow Men: “Between the idea and the action falls the shadow.” Anyone who has spent any time in and/or around political parties billing themselves as “big tents”; communities calling themselves “mosaics”’ boards calling themselves “representative”, or institutions calling themselves “multidisciplinary”, will know something of the shadow and will know that while diversity may well be an essential prerequisite for the blossoming of collective human creativity, other less desirable outcomes are possible. So we are left having to acknowledge that while diversity may be a necessary condition for fostering and nurturing the best in us, it is not a sufficient one. It comes down to this: How might we exploit diversity’s manifest potential for creativity while, at the same time, avoiding its equally manifest potential for dysfunctionality?

It’s a big question and not one that can be answered here. But I think I know where we have to begin and that is by acknowledging that mosaics don’t just happen - they are works of art and have to be created. Goodwill helps but it’s not enough - something which the makers of jazz music understand quite well. Each instrument has its own language and its own revered ancestors. Stan Getz looms large for saxophonists; Oscar Peterson for pianists; Charlie Mingus for bassists. The list goes on. There is, however, a shared tradition of collaboration. What keeps this diversity of tongues from becoming mere babble is a few fundamental agreements that constitute a governance system for an art form committed to innovation and perpetual self-renewal. For the past five years, the musicians of Getting in the Groove have been exploring the nature of the improvised jazz performance with a wide variety of organizations and community groups. Out of this shared experience have come insights that can transform the rhetoric about mosaics into the works of art they must become. I believe I may just have created an agenda for the next several issues of Random Riffs!

March
10

Getting in the Groove