Our poor, tired little island just can't cope': race, immigration and 'decline' in the post-war EnglishMidlands, c.1958-1981

我们可怜、疲惫的小岛根本无法应对”：战后英国中部地区的种族、移民和“衰落”，约 1958 年至 1981 年

• 批准号: 2446743
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University of Nottingham
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2020 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-2446743
• 关键词: Our; poor; tired; little; island

Inspired by Stuart Hall's observation that 'the notion of decline is caught up with the question of an embattled national identity', this study will examine how hostility to immigration in Britain c.1958-1981both stemmed from and contributed to popular perceptions of 'national decline'. This period is critical, containing the high-point of Commonwealth immigration (and legislation to restrict it), the end of empire, perceived economic underperformance, and myriad other social changes, conflated in the concept of 'decline'. Temporality is overlooked in relation to these issues; conceptions of the past (memory) and future were central to how immigration was imagined in these years, and to ideas of decline. For example, in his invocation of an apocalyptic future resulting from immigration in his infamous 'rivers of blood' speech, Enoch Powell collapsed the future into the present, creating a sense of urgency through his words which prompted a huge popular response. I will examine these questions through the cases of three Midlands cities, each interesting for its own reasons: Nottingham was the location of notorious 'race riots' in 1958, Leicester became well-known for its large Asian population and as a National Front stronghold in the 1970s, while Birmingham and the West Midlands area saw an infamously racist election campaign in Smethwick in 1964, plus Powell's aforementioned speech in 1968. They also experienced different patterns of demographic and economic change. I found connections being drawn between immigration and decline in my undergraduate dissertation research on 'South Asians in Leicester, c.1970-1990', both in terms of competition over resources, unemployment and deindustrialisation, and the linked notion of an 'embattled national identity'. Through local examples, we can complicate and de-centre orthodox accounts written from the centre, and also trace similarities and contrasts between how race relations evolved in different contexts.On the basis of my undergraduate record, I was awarded Nottingham's Tranfield Scholarship for 2019,covering the cost of tuition on the History MA course. I would be pleased as part of M4C to work with Nottingham's Centre for the Study of Political Ideologies, Birmingham's Centre for Modern British Studies, the East Midlands Oral History Archive at Leicester and the Modern Records Centre at Warwick. My proposed supervisors put me in excellent position for doctoral study in this subject: Dr Blackburn is a specialist in twentieth-century British political ideologies, Professor Schaffer in the formulation and dissemination of racial ideas, and Dr Peplow in Black British political participation.

受斯图尔特·霍尔（Stuart Hall）的观察启发，即“衰落的概念陷入了一个四面楚歌的民族身份问题”，这项研究将研究英国对移民的敌意是如何源于1958- 1981年，这是源于“国家衰落”的普遍看法。 '。这个时期至关重要，其中包含了英联邦移民的高点（以及限制帝国的立法），帝国的终结，感知的经济不佳和无数的社会变革，这与“衰落”的概念混为一谈。与这些问题有关的时间性被忽略了；过去（记忆）和未来的概念是这些年来移民的想象以及衰落思想的核心。例如，在他臭名昭著的“血河”演讲中移民带来的世界末日未来的援引中，以诺·鲍威尔（Enoch Powell）崩溃了未来，通过他的话通过他的话语造成了一种紧迫感，这引起了人们的巨大民众反应。我将通过三个中部城市的案例来研究这些问题，每个城市都出于自身的原因而有趣：诺丁汉是1958年臭名昭著的“种族暴动”的所在地，莱斯特以其庞大的亚洲人口而闻名1970年代，伯明翰和西米德兰兹地区于1964年在Smethwick举行了臭名昭著的种族主义竞选活动，加上鲍威尔在1968年的上述演讲。他们还经历了不同的人口和经济变化模式。我发现，关于“莱斯特的南亚人，1970- 1990年”的移民和下降之间的联系，无论是在资源，失业和去工业化的竞争方面，都在'。通过当地的例子，我们可以使从中心写的正统账户复杂化，并追踪种族关系如何在不同背景下演变的相似之处和对比。在我的本科记录的基础上，我获得了诺丁汉的2019年Tranfield奖学金，2019年的Tranfield奖学金，涵盖在历史课程中的学费。作为M4C的一员，我很高兴与诺丁汉的政治意识形态研究中心，伯明翰现代英国研究中心，莱斯特的东米德兰兹口头历史档案和沃里克现代唱片中心合作。我提出的主管在此主题上使我处于博士学位研究中的出色地位：布莱克本博士是20世纪英国政治意识形态的专家，夏弗教授在种族思想的制定和传播方面，在黑人英国政治参与中进行了Peplow博士。