NewVIc World in London lecture London: a diverse global city shaped by immigration Eddie Playfair

NewVIc World in London lecture

London: a diverse global city shaped by immigration

Eddie Playfair

A very brief introduction to:

Who came?

Why?

When?

Where?

Everything we say will be a generalisation

UK residents born abroad

The London boroughs

Hughenots in London

Little Italy

Irish “navvies”

London’s docklands

The London docks

Lascars

When Chinatown was in Limehouse

The Silvertown refinery

Walter Tull 1888-1918

The Jewish East End

Cable street 1936

Empire Windrush passengers 1948

Notting Hill 1958

Claudia Jones

1972: Ugandan Asians arrive in Britain

1743: La neuve eglise1819: Methodist chapel1891: Machzikei Hadass1976: ব্রি�ক লে�ন জামে� �সব্রিজাদ

1978

1978 Murder of Altab Ali

Rock against Racism 1978

Banglatown today

1993…..to 2012

Racism old and new…

“We are a nation of refugees” The Times, 1858

“London is the most and most successfully multicultural city in Europe…Diasporas have sustained us.” China Mieville, 2012

Why is all this important?

London’s global success; economic, cultural and social, is partly due to being a global city which reflects the world and is open to the world. Londoners speak the world’s languages, understand the world’s cultures and are facing the world’s issues: inequalities, tensions and conflicts.

We need to know more about our past and where we’ve come from.We need to know about our various and multiple identities.