BBNAN 13000: British Society and Culture

Migration to the UK after 1945

Autumn 2017

BBNAN 13000: British Societa and Culture

Migration to Britain after 1945

Welcome to this course!

Lecturer: Karáth Tamás ()

Classes: Fri 10.15-11.45, ♯221

Office hours: Tue and Fri 11.50-12.30, ♯040

The BA program in general invites you to encounters with modern British society at several points of your studies (UK Civilization seminar, British History lecture and other courses related to modern cultural studies and literature). Rarely do these courses elaborate on a theme in its broader context. This course will engage with a narrower theme, which, however, implies the acquaintance with broader civilisation issues, such as British topography, ethnic minorities in Britain, education and the institutions of government. The focus of the course will be migration to Britain after 1945. We shall survey the history of post-war migration, the composition of immigrants, immigration policies and the issue of integration.

Methods

The seminar will be based on the discussion of home readings and project work.

Requirements

Non-graded requirements:

  • Class attendance (no more than 3 absences)
  • Reading the assigned texts
  • Preparing a teaching material (one task) for the classes of 24 Nov and 1 Dec

Graded requirements:

  • Presentation of an assigned article with ppt illustration
  • End-of-term test: The material of the test is based on the seminar readings

Assessment of the course

The course is not valid if you miss more than three classes. Please respect the deadlines. The final grade will be the weighted average of the graded tasks of the seminar, in which the presentation counts with 40% and the end-of-term test with 60%. Averages of .5 will be rounded according to your contributions to group discussions. Extra points for the test can be gained from the group work in the classes of 24 Nov and 1 Dec. No extra point will be added to a test with a score below 50%.

Course calendar

Sep 15 - Introducing the seminar and assigning the tasks

Sep 22 – The current picture: The state of migration in present-day Britain

Readings: (1) “Migrants in the UK: An Overview”, The Migration Observatory

http://www.migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/migrants-in-the-uk-an-overview/

(2) Dominic Casciani, “Census 2011: Rapid change amid rapid immigration” BBC News, http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-20681551

Sep 29 – Post-WWII immigration history

Reading: Pintér Károly, Introduction to Britain (Piliscsaba: PPKE, 2010) Chapter 8.4 (Ethnic minorities, pp. 127-32)

Oct 6 – Post-WWII migration stories 1: Presentation of the articles on the website Our Migration Story

(1) Music and migration: Songs from the Irish in Birmingham

http://www.ourmigrationstory.org.uk/oms/music-and-migration-sounds-of-the-irish-diaspora

(2) London on the move: West Indian transport workers

http://www.ourmigrationstory.org.uk/oms/london-on-the-move-west-indian-transport-workers

(3) Murder in Notting Hill

http://www.ourmigrationstory.org.uk/oms/murder-in-notting-hill

Oct 13 – No class

Oct 20 – Post-WWII migration stories 2: Presentation of the articles on the website Our Migration Story

(1) Darcus Howe and Britain’s Black Power movement

http://www.ourmigrationstory.org.uk/oms/darcus-howe-and-britains-black-power-movement

(2) On the picket line: Jayaben Desai from East Africa to Grunwick

http://www.ourmigrationstory.org.uk/oms/from-east-africa-to-grunwick-jayaben-desai

(3) Families divided: the campaign for Anwar Ditta and her children

http://www.ourmigrationstory.org.uk/oms/families-divided-the-campaign-for-anwar-ditta-and-her-children

Oct 27 – Migration and political rhetoric in the 1960s

Reading: Enoch Powell’s “Rivers of blood” speech

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/3643823/Enoch-Powells-Rivers-of-Blood-speech.html

Nov 3 – Migration and political rhetoric in the 1980s

Readings: (1) Margaret Thatcher’s “Cheltenham speech” (3 July 1982)

http://www.margaretthatcher.org/speeches/displaydocument.asp?docid=104989

(2) Salman Rushdie, “The New Empire within Britain”

http://public.wsu.edu/~hegglund/courses/389/rushdie_new_empire.htm

Nov 10 – Muslims in focus

Reading: British Muslims in Numbers – A Demographic, Socio-economic and Health Profile of Muslims in Britain Drawing on the 2011 Census, Parts 1-3

https://www.mcb.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/MCBCensusReport_2015.pdf

Nov 17 – Contemporary migration and responses

Readings: (1) Polish migration after 2004

http://www.ourmigrationstory.org.uk/oms/polish-migration-after-2004

(2) ‘Go Home’: Responses to migration in Britain today

http://www.ourmigrationstory.org.uk/oms/go-home-responses-to-migration-in-britain-today

Nov 24 – Workshop 1: The changes of migration policies in Britain after 2000

Dec 1 – Workshop 2: Migration and Brexit

Dec 8 – Holiday

Dec 15 – End-of-term test

Description of tasks

(1) Ppt presentations

The ppt presentations should summarize the articles in 10 minutes and discuss one of the questions at the end of the article in 5 minutes. The presentations will be graded according to the following aspects:

Aspects of assessment / Maximum point
I. Summary / 20
1.1 Grasping the main ideas / 10
1.2 Balance, structure / 5
1.3 Informative / 5
II. Oral Delivery / 12
2.1 Fluency, pace, pauses, emphases / 4
2.2 Grammar and appropriacy / 4
2.3 Audience involvement (contact) / 2
2.4 Timing / 2
III. PPT Design / 8
3.1 Aesthetics, Visibility of text, Balance of text and images / 3
3.2 ppt text (spelling, grammar, style) / 2
3.3 Cover and contents pages / 2
3.4 Overall organization / 1
IV. Discussion of the Question / 10
total / 50

You can sign up for the presentation topics in the first class.

(2) End-of-term test

The term test will conclude comprehension exercises related to the readings of the course. Further details will be discussed in the first class or via e-mail upon personal enquiries.

(3) Designing teaching materials for the workshop classes of 24 Nov and 1 Dec

Steps of the task:

·  Find a relevant and scholarly article related to the theme of the class

·  Read and understand the article

·  On the basis of your text, prepare one task which your fellow students will have to solve in the workshop classes. Please remember that no one else in the class will read your text, so you cannot assume that your fellow students have a shared knowledge of it. You have to invent a creative task that is doable by your fellows. You may provide them some background information. You have to prepare a task from which your fellows can learn. The working time planned for each task should not exceed 7 minutes.

·  Students preparing tasks for the same workshop class have to consult on the overall concept of the quiz and edit all the tasks in one exercise sheet.

Recommended reading

Panayi, Panikos. An Immigration History of Britain: Multicultural racism since 1800. London: Routledge, 2014

Statement on plagiarism

Academic research and its presentation are embedded in a large dialogue. In the process of thinking and arguing we are necessarily influenced by others: we borrow ideas from other writings and integrate them into our own. You can use others’ ideas or words in form of literal quotes or paraphrases, but you must indicate the source of quotes, paraphrased passages, and all sorts of factual information in all cases. The failure of keeping a correct record of borrowed material, either due to ignorance or to deliberate theft of ideas, is plagiarism. Written assignments and presentations showing evident signs of plagiarism will fail.

Enjoy the course!

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