Black Europe Flashcards
(40 cards)
What are e difficulties associated with counting how many black people there are in Europe?
- difficulties in defining Europe
- refusal of many nations (except UK and Ireland) to collect race data
- estimates based on immigration data and birth data
- failure to account for temporary residents
- a lot of misinformation produced by people who seek to exaggerate numbers
Approximately how many Black people are in Europe according to Small?
7 million (out of 770 million)
Approximately how many black people are in the UK? France?
2 million each
Which countries does Small class as the ‘strident imperialists’ and what defines this class?
Strident imperialist have relatively large Black populations at present. They had an extensive, deeply exploitative and long-standing colonial involvement.
UK, France, Netherlands, Portugal and Belgium
What countries does Small class as ‘strident imperialists with relatively small black populations’ and what defines this classification?
Relatively small populations of black people. Extensive, deeply exploitative and long lasting colonial involvement
Spain, Italy and Germany
What countries does Small class as ‘peripheral colonial beneficiaries with negligible black populations’ and what defines this classification?
Relatively small black populations. Comparatively limited direct involvement in colonialism.
Denmark, Norway, Sweden and the Republic of Ireland
What proportion of Black people in the UK live in Greater London?
60%
Where are the majority of Black people from in the UK, France and Netherlands?
The Caribbean and west Africa
Where are the majority of black people from in Denmark, Norway and Sweden?
The Horn of Africa
When do most analysts say that British immigration policies became explicitly racialised?
1940s - 1970s (post ww2)
There are two different academic views as to why Britain became increadingly racialised. What are they?
- (miles and Phizacklea) small racist pressure groups lead by politicans and involving members of the community
- (siviandan) as result of thae activities of the state - labour demands
What initial policies were there in Britain to encourage immigration from common wealth countries?
‘open door’ policy of British Rail, NHS, London Transport, and others to recruit labour (limited aid with housing, language and integration)
british nationality act of 1948 gave all commonwealth citizens the right to work, settle adn enter Britain
When were the notting hill riots and what were they a response to?
1958
a response to frequent attacks on black citizens by whites, ‘the colour bar’ at clubs and general racial tensions that made it hard for black people to live
What policies were implementated to restrict immigration in Britain from commonwealth countries?
1962, 1968 - commonwealth immigration act - required immigrants from the commonwealth to have work vouchers (specifically aimed at commonwealth citizens)
1960s and 70s - series of policies to institute the ‘new commonwealth’
1971 - immigration act under tory government
What polices in Britain were implemented in an attempt to alleviate racial tensions?
1965, 1968, 1976, 2000 Race relations act
national committee for commonwealth immigrants in the early 60s
What was the main affect on Race relations of the New labour government (90s-00s)?
heightened fears about refugees and asylum seekers - added new dimensions to notions of race
increased xenophobia
Drawing on Aitken’s article describe how the history of Black people in Germany provides an exception to middle passage epistemology?
Describes the experiences of black people (not slaves) in Germany.
Human zoos, educational vistors, political players
shows how blackness is defined in other contexts - michelle wright the physics of blackness.
Shows blackness as a sepctacle, othered in a different way
often came under the purveyorship of a white ‘guardian’
What are the striking similarities between different countries in Black Europe?
- Ambiguous hyper(in)visibility - images of Black people are manily poor, criminials, sexworkers, refugees, black people suffering (Negative images) or as celebrities (mainly American), musicians (beyonce, Lady Leshur, Senebo Sey), atheltes (Jessica Ennis, Patricia Mimona)
- Entrenched Vulnerability - There isn’t a single area that black women are doing better than white women, Black people tend to be poorer and have a worse quality of life
- Institutional racisms - governmentally instituitoanlised racist policies (eg stop and search, restricted immigration, rise of the right wing in europe), racist traditions e.g. Black Piet in the Netherlands
- irrepressible resistance and resilience - protests, demonstrations, groups, organisations, opposition to unjust policies, development of knowledge and education on colonialism and its legacy, art
How is Black Europe gendered?
- images of black female body sexualised - interesecting forms of discrimination
- black women tend to be more involved with the resistance, academic and resistance movement
- mainly put in subordinate jobs (Public service sector eg nursing, private (domestic) servicce sector eg cooks, sex work)
- women migrate differently because they are often tasked with looking after the children
What characterises the black presence in Germany in the modern day?
- no official census of black people, immigrants and children used as indictors
- majority of black people are citizens, or legal residents
- about 1 million black people
- large numbers born in Germany
- Growing numbers of nigerians since the 1990s
- majority in cities (Berlin, Frankfurt, Hamburg)
- large numbers of people of mixed black/white origins
- limited studies of Race, conflation of race and race science, fears being seen as Nazi-like
- Blackness and Germanness seen as incompatible
- overrepresentation in negative images (poverty, unemployment) underrespresentation in movies, tv, etc
What historical factors affect the experience of Black Germans?
- 1884 Berlin Conference: Germany obtained the colonies of Cameroon, Togo, German East Africa, German Southwest Africa, the colonies were confiscated after world war 1 in 1918
- Africans in Germany pre-1914 were there in small numbers (around 1000, mainly men) as participants in a spectacle, educational visitors or for political reasons
- `ww2: motivated in part by Hitlers desire to regain the colonies, sterilisation, race science and eugenics
- Lorde’s presence in Germany 1984
Black German Knowledge production - discuss.
- El Tayeb: challenges the notion of US as the exemplary case of diaspora identity, US is an anomoly
- Difficult to discuss issues of race when government denied its existence
- V Thompson: Radical Black analysis Germany, what do you do for Black people in places with very few Black people? Develop multicultural alliances, reach out to black diaspora
- black studies overwhelmingly external
What historical factors affect the experience of Black Swedes?
- history of actively embracing eugenics and ‘racial hygiene’ 1922 Swedish institute for Race Biology
- Swedish set up companies to colonise Africa and the Caribbean
- play a ‘middle-man’ position in the slave trade which grew their economy rapidly in the 1880s [production/exports: wood, iron, farming, clothes, fish, maritime knowledge; imports: coffee, sugar, cotton, tabacco]
What characterises the black presence in Sweden in the modern day?
- no official census, ‘race’ talk ignored
- UN study 2015 showed clear evidence of racial inequality
- about 300,00 black people out of the 10 million population
- majority of afro-swedes arrived in the 1990s
- mainly muslims (at least 90%)
- currently majority are citizens, or legal residents, significant numbers born in sweden
- majority in cities, mainly stockholm
- growing number of mixed people
- stereotypes, housing and employment struggles
- black people seen as either criminals/poor/immigrants or are musicians(eg Seinebo Sey)/athletes
- resistance and organisation
- 1 member of parliment that is Black Jallow Mamadou
