The Emergence of Desh Pardesh: Introduction

In: Desh Pardesh: The South Asian Presence in Britain. London, Hurst and Co. 1994

Preview

PDF, English Download (113kB) | Terms of use Download (113kB)

Abstract

Although our central concern in this book is to explore the way in which migrants from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh have set about making themselves at home in Britain, it is well worth remembering that immigration itself is anything but an unprecedented phenomenon. Throughout its history Britain has been a recipient of immigrant inflows, as with the Celts, Anglo-Saxons and Normans in the relatively distant past, supplemented by the more recent arrival of substantial numbers of Irish, Jewish and Eastern European settlers. Thus while the most recent wave of arrivals — in which migrant workers were drawn in from the Indian subcontinent and the islands of the Caribbean to fill the yawning gaps that emerged in the British labour market during the years of the post-war boom — is in some senses nothing but the latest episode in a long chain of developments, it has nevertheless brought about a profound and indeed irreversible change in the whole character of the British social order. First, Britain is now a visibly multi-racial society, in the sense that its citizens now include 2.7 million people who are either wholly or partly of non-European ancestry. Secondly, and just as important, it has become a much more overtly polyethnic society. Inspired as they are by cultural, religious and linguistic traditions whose roots lie far beyond the boundaries of Europe, the new minorities have significantly expanded the range of diversities covered by local British lifestyles.