The author, Néstor García Canclini begins the text regarding “Rethinking Identities through Hybridization” by stating that, “one must begin by accepting the dispute over whether ‘hybrid’ is a good or bad word. That the word is widely used is not sufficient for us to consider it respectable. On the contrary, its profuse employment favors the assignment to it of divergent meanings.”

The author highlights the common theme of ambivalence in delimiting theories of mixture, noting that the employment of such terms in different contexts makes uniform definitions  difficult.  It is also important to  note  his insistence of the removal of the good/bad dichotomy, as this allows for the understanding of hybridization as a process and not necessarily a uniform negative or positive result.  Canclini provides readers a foundational definition by delimiting his own understanding of hybridization.  “I will start with a first definition: I understand for hybridization sociocultural processes in which discrete structures or practices, previously existing in separate form, are combined to generate new structures, objects, and practices.”

The author takes the example of the common framing of Spanglish, or the “hybrid” language that takes from both English and Spanish. This notion undermines or ignores the potential for both English and Spanish to be the result of hybridization of other languages (Arabic, Latin, etc.) The author makes two points here, that hybridization is a generative process, which combines previously separate structures, to create new structures, as well as putting forth the notion that culture (and its extensions) are also inherently a processes of hybridization. The author goes on to say, “by reducing the conceptual hierarchy of identity and heterogeneity in favor of hybridization, we remove support from policies of fundamentalist homogenization or the limited (segregated) recognition of “the plurality of cultures,”  making the case for a theory of mixture that avoids hierarchy or privileging one culture over another.

The author further examines the process of hybridization as facilitated by globalization. Canclini states that, “globalizing processes accentuate modern cross-cultural contact by creating world markets for money and material goods, messages, and migrants. The flows and interactions that occur in these processes have diminished the power of border and customs agents, as well as the autonomy of local traditions, and have fostered a greater variety of hybridizations in production, communication, and styles of consumption than in the past. ” In this way we can see how physical trade and exchange by way of globalization allow for the movement of  products and cultural practices that cannot be contained by borders or territory lines.