London is the Place for Me: Black Britons, Citizenship and the Politics of Race

by Kennetta Hammond Perry

Overview

Black people in the British Empire have long challenged the notion that "there ain't no black in the Union Jack." For the post-World War II wave of Afro-Caribbean migrants, many of whom had long been subjects of the Empire, claims to a British identity and imperial citizenship were considered to be theirs by birthright. However, while Britain was internationally touted as a paragon of fair play and equal justice, they arrived in a nation that was frequently hostile and unwilling to incorporate Black people into its concept of what it meant to be British. In London Is The Place for Me, Kennetta Hammond Perry brings together a variety of sources including calypso music, photographs, migrant narratives, and records of grassroots Black political organizations to explores how Afro-Caribbean migrants navigated the politics of race and citizenship in Britain. Her examination expands our understanding of race and the Black experience in Europe and uncovers the critical role that Black people played in the formation of contemporary British society.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780190909949
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	09/01/2018
Series:	Transgressing Boundaries: Studies in Black Politics and Black Communities
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Kennetta Hammond Perry is Associate Professor of History at East Carolina University.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Windrush Politics
Chapter 1: Race, Empire and the Formation of Black Britain
Chapter 2: Migration, Citizenship and the Boundaries of Belonging
Chapter 3: 'Race Riots' and the Mystique of British Anti-Racism
Chapter 4: Are We to Be Mauled Down Just Because We Are Black?
Chapter 5: Exposing the Racial Politics of Immigration Controls
Chapter 6: The Limits of Campaigning Against Racial Discrimination
Epilogue: Black Britain, the State and the Politics of Race

Editorial Reviews

"London Is the Place for Me tells the beautiful story of how a defiant, steadfast, organized people made the Union Jack black. Kennetta Perry's illuminating and deeply researched book documents how Afro-Caribbean migrants resisted British racism, radically redefined the meaning of citizenship, and transformed post-war England in the process. Jolly old London Town will never been the same." -Robin D. G. Kelley, author of Africa Speaks, America Answers: Modern Jazz and Revolutionary Times (2012)

"An absorbing, timely, and inspiring account. Kennetta Hammond Perry captures vividly the challenges Windrush-era migrants faced. But she also shows that grassroots organizing by Afro-Caribbeans really did make a difference, changing formal and unspoken exclusions and bringing about a more inclusive definition of what 'Britain' could be. This is a story that matters." -Lara Putnam, Professor and Chair of History, University of Pittsburgh

"How were Black British imaginaries of 'belonging,' and of imperial 'subject rights,' challenged in practice, after the War? Perry's work skillfully explores bedrock sources that illuminate daily life, expectations, and the contradictory realities of lived experience for West Indians in motion. She follows ideas and movement from their roots in the Caribbean, into a reconstituted metropolitan racial politics-from the streets to the halls of power. Her work assuredly enters the canon of burgeoning Black British scholarship, as a rich and provocative research study and as an argument about the ironies of British claims properly juxtaposed with Black perception-both local and global." -Susan Dabney Pennybacker, Chalmers W. Poston Distinguished Professor of European History, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

"A genuinely post-Windrush history of Britain, driven by the experiences of Afro-Caribbean migrants, is long overdue. Perry offers us a glimpse into the vibrant everyday life of mid-20th century black Britons who had one eye on London and the other on global race politics. London Is the Place for Me revises narratives of postwar British history to account not just for the presence of people of African descent but for the ways they shaped key debates and landmark moments at all scales of political practice as well." -Antoinette Burton, Professor of History and Bastian Professor of Global and Transnational Studies, University of Illinois

"[A] brilliant account on the transnational and multi-faceted perspective of race politics. London is the place for me contributes from a historical point of view to an interdisciplinary debate that stretches beyond academia and still reverberates in contemporary societies." — Ana Moledo, Leipzig University, Connections: A Journal for Historians and Area Specialists

From the Publisher