AustLit

'This article examines the limitations of Australian multiculturalism via an analysis of Simone Lazaroo's semi-autobiographical novel The World Waiting to be Made, which charts the life of a young mixed race woman in suburban Perth. Through a close reading of this novel, this article argues that current modes of multiculturalism are ill-equipped to deal with people of racially and culturally mixed heritages. Furthermore, through an exploration of the novel and the work of Caribbean scholars Édouard Glissant and Fernando Ortiz this essay asserts that concepts of syncretism, opacity and transculturation may provide alternative modes of perceiving difference within the nation.' (Author's abstract)