Skip to main content
Tag

Windrush

The Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Reverend Justin Welby, addresses the General Synod at Church House in London.

Church of England to apologize for being ‘deeply institutionally racist’

By News & Current Affairs

By Ivana Kottasová, CNN — The Church of England has decided to apologize for racism experienced by “countless black, Asian and minority ethnic people” over the past 70 years. The Church said in a statement that the General Synod, its legislative body, voted on last Tuesday to issue an official apology and commission an outside expert to prepare a report on racism, race and ethnicity in the church. Speaking at the synod,…

Read More
Prince Charles and Camilla Duchess of Cornwall with Mia Mottley, the prime minister of Barbados, 19 March 2019.

What if the Caribbean refused royal visits until reparations were paid?

By Commentaries/Opinions, Reparations

Charles and Camilla are the latest to arrive and help whitewash the injustices of slavery and empire. By Nalini Mohabir, The Guardian — Once upon a time monarchs ruled by divine right, then later with charismatic authority. The future king Prince Charles (#NotMyPrince) has neither. Yet Caribbean governments are paying for Prince Charles and Camilla’s royal tour of the Caribbean which began on Sunday and continues for 12 days, to…

Read More
When Franco Rosso’s “Babylon” premièred at Cannes, in 1980, it was hailed for its soulful depictions of a community largely invisible in British media.Photograph Courtesy Kino Lorber Repertory / Seventy-Seven

What “Babylon” Captured About Racism and Reggae

By Editors' Choice

By Hua Hsu, The New Yorker — In June, 1948, the H.M.T. Empire Windrush docked in the Port of Tilbury, near London. Among its passengers were approximately eight hundred West Indian workers, mostly from Jamaica, who had come in response to England’s postwar labor shortage. Some planned to earn money and return home; others wondered what it would be like to stay. There was a lot of work to be…

Read More
Jamaican immigrants aboard the "Empire Windrush" in 1948.

The Caribbean Immigrants Who Transformed Britain

By Commentaries/Opinions

By Kaila Philo, The New Republic — Seventy years ago today—June 22, 1948—a passenger ship carrying 492 Jamaican immigrants arrived in Essex, London. The Empire Windrush was the first of many ships to come, as the British government recruited migrants from the Caribbean Commonwealth to help rebuild the economy after World War II. These arrivals came to be known as the Windrush generation. “It is unclear how many people belong to the Windrush generation,…

Read More
The Empire Windrush, photographed a few years after its famous journey from Jamaica to Tilbury Docks. PA Archive

Empire Windrush: how the BBC reported Caribbean migrants’ mixed reception in 1948

By Editors' Choice

By James Procter, The Conversation — Amid the celebrations to mark the 70th anniversary of the arrival of Empire Windrush from the Caribbean in 1948, much has been made of the warm welcome that once greeted those migrant men and women in Britain’s hour of need, as postwar reconstruction got underway. But it’s important Britain remembers that moment for what it was: a story of mixed reception. Despite and because of…

Read More
Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May, centre left, hosts a meeting with leaders and representatives of Caribbean countries, inside 10 Downing Street in central London, Tuesday April 17, 2017, on the sidelines of the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting (CHOGM). May met with Caribbean leaders and envoys Tuesday, and told them "we are genuinely sorry for any anxiety that has been caused" personally apologizing for the treatment of long-term U.K. residents from the Caribbean who have been asked to prove their right to stay in the country.

Windrush: Brexit and Blackxit

By Commentaries/Opinions

By Professor Sir Hilary Beckles — Caribbean Prime Ministers witnessed it first-hand. They were gathered in England as a Commonwealth when Prime Minister May tried to take the sails out of the Windrush. They spoke of the crime of citizenship denied; they demanded justice for all West Indians. Prime Minister Holness spoke to the press and held the centre for the Caribbean. There was vexation in his eyes but his…

Read More