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Cultural Diversity - Multi-Ethnic Britain (1)

Introduction

Given the opportunity to describe themselves in terms of their ancestry, place of birth, history of migration, religion, and how long they have lived in the host culture, people often refer to themselves from perspectives that reveal the complexities of their identities.

The pattern of migration and the reasons for migration determine how people perceive themselves in relation to the new environment, and their experiences within the prevailing culture. As time moves on, children of migrants who are born in the adopted country develop their own identities with respect to the country they live in. Their values, beliefs, experiences and aspirations are in part shaped by the prevailing culture. However, in many instances, migrant adults form 'communities' that reflect some of the collective values, beliefs and lifestyles of the culture they left behind. Communities emerge, centred on the ethnic and cultural identities that people hold. Therefore, children of immigrants are often in contact with different cultural values. Thus, as the Parekh report notes, there are many 'ethnicities' and many 'communities' in Britain today  (The Runnymede Trust, 2000). Children born to parents who are from mixed ethnic and cultural backgrounds further highlight the accelerated transitions that ethnic and cultural identities have undergone.

In everyday conversation and the media, one may hear of the 'Asian community' or the 'African-Caribbean community'. These terms are used as though the 'community' being mentioned is homogeneous, whereas in actual fact they hide the diversity within the said communities. Therefore, the term 'Asian community' is quite misleading. As with other communities, the diversity within the 'Asian community' or the 'African-Caribbean', the 'white', Irish, Jewish, African, Gypsy /Traveller, Somali (and many more communities) gets forgotten or not explored further. The 'white' group has within it people as different in their origins and ethnic identities as are those grouped together under the previously stated categories such as the 'Asian community'. Thus, the 'white' group may not acknowledge people who in terms of skin colour may identify themselves as 'white' but whose origins are in the Mediterranean, such as Greece and Cyprus, or eastern Europe, such as Hungary and Yugoslavia. It is more helpful to identify the diversities within these communities since that would reflect the true nature of the diversity within and between communities.

The Parekh Report (The Runnymede Trust, 2000) has considered the transitions that ethnic groups undergo and has acknowledged that there are communities within what has been previously considered homogeneous groups. The use of the term 'community of communities' in the Parekh report seems to convey the essence of diversity within and between ethnic groups, and the representation of each ethnic group as a community.

Modood and colleagues (1997) suggest that generational shifts in identity have been observed, for example, between the migrant generation and the second generation. They go on to say that 'minority identities are continually changing and reinventing themselves through fusing of majority cultures' (p.338). Identities are potentially less stable.

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