Urban Cohabitations as Forms of Multiculturality in 21st-Century Western Europe.

What it means to live after the trauma of the First World War in 1920s London is a question posed by one of England’s most significant writers, Virginia Woolf, in her work “Mrs. Dalloway“ This question evokes a specific state of consciousness that reveals how the inhabitants of urban metropolises early in the twentieth century coped with burdens, negative thoughts, and profound social upheavals.

Likewise, a major city is at the centre of this work whose analysis captures the phenomenon of urban cohabitation as an expression of multiculturality in 21st century Western Europe. The metropolis under investigation is located in Western Germany and is the capital of North Rhine-Westphalia: Düsseldorf.

Düsseldorf serves as an empirical case through which urban dynamics can be interpreted. The moods and atmospheres that shape everyday life in this city range from a diverse social world marked by languages, cultures, and lifestyles to a visible form of diversity continuously negotiated among its residents. At the same time, an atmosphere of anonymity and individuality emerges – characterised by limited social control - highlights not so much a lived sense of community as a societal coexistence structured by parallel modes of living.

From a scholarly perspective, these everyday cultural phenomena are illuminated through the works of key figures in classical sociology, including Émile Durkheim, Georg Simmel, Max Horkheimer, Theodor W. Adorno, and Jürgen Habermas. Theoretical perspectives gain vividness through an empirical approach: in this context, pedestrians on the streets of Düsseldorf, as well as representatives from politics, culture, religion, and actors from the fashion, music, and theatre scenes, are given a voice. In doing so, the discourse acquires a “touch of life” that connects theoretical reflections with concrete urban experiences.