Salah Hassan and Iftikhar Dadi (eds.)

Unpacking Europe
Towards a Critical Reading

Design: Karelse en den Besten
Illustrated (colour and b/w), paperback, sewn, 468 pages, size: 24 x 17 cm
text in English, ISBN 90-5662-233-1, € 38.50 / OUT OF PRINT

Unpacking Europe is an exciting collection of scholarly essays and artists' projects which interrogate the historical and contemporary meanings of Europe. Examining the construction of 'Europeanness', this volume focuses on the contradictions between homogenizing official narratives and everyday realities of urban life, where heterogeneity and hybridity have long been the living norms. The theme is timely, given the political climate in Europe, its shifting demographics, and the rising xenophobia and hardening of immigration policies.

Unpacking Europe serves as a reader on the topic for an academic audience. It is also essential reading for anyone who is interested in Europe's historical and contemporary role in the global context, especially in philosophical, social, and cultural contexts.

Art critic and curator Salah Hassan is Chair of the Department of the History of Art at Cornell University. He curated Authentic/Ex-centric, the African pavilion for the 49th Venice Biennale (2001). Artist Iftikhar Dadi is a doctoral candidate in the History of Art at Cornell University.