Ashley Dawson - Mongrel Nation: Diasporic Culture and the Making of Postcolonial Britain

MONGREL NATION

Ashley Dawson

Diasporic Culture and the
Making of Postcolonial Britain

THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN PRESS
Ann Arbor

Page iv Copyright by the University of Michigan 2007
All rights reserved
Published in the United States of America by
The University of Michigan Press
Manufactured in the United States of Americac
Printed on acid-free paper

2010 2009 2008 2007 4 3 2 1

No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form
or by any means, electronic, mechanical, or otherwise,
without the written permission of the publisher.

A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the British Library.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Dawson, Ashley, 1965

Mongrel nation : diasporic culture and the making of postcolonial

Britain / Ashley Dawson.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-0-472-09991-7 (cloth : acid-free paper)
ISBN-10: 0-472-09991-4 (cloth : acid-free paper)
ISBN-13: 978-0-472-06991-0 (pbk. : acid-free paper)
ISBN-10: 0-472-06991-8 (pbk. : acid-free paper)
1. English literatureMinority authorsHistory and criticism.

2. English literature20th centuryHistory and criticism. 3. Commonwealth literature (English)History and criticism. 4. Postcolonialism in literature. 5. Immigrants in literature. 6. Minorities in literature. 7. Literature and societyGreat BritainHistory20th century. 8. PostcolonialismGreat Britain. 9. Pluralism (Social sciences)Great Britain. 10. Ethnic groupsGreat BritainHistory20th century. I. Title.

PR120.M55D39 2007

820.9'3552dc22

2006036421

ISBN13 978-0-472-02505-3 (electronic)

D ANIEL D EFOE ,The True-Born Englishman

Thus from a mixture of all kinds began,
That Hetrogeneous Thing, An Englishman:
In eager Rapes, and furious Lust begot,
Betwixt a Painted Britton and a Scot:
Whose gendring Offspring quickly learned to bow,
And yoke their Heifers to the Roman Plough:
From whence a Mongrel Half-Bred Race there came,
With neither Name nor Nation, Speech or Fame.
In whose hot Veins new Mixtures quickly ran,
Infusd betwixt a Saxon and a Dane.
While their Rank Daughters, to their Parents just,
Receivd all Nations with Promiscuous Lust.
This Nauseous Brood directly did contain
The well-extracted blood of Englishmen.

T HIS PROJECT HAS BEEN VERY LONG IN THE GESTATION , and, consequently, bears with it an immense number of debts. If I have neglected anyone in this long list of thanks, I beg your forgiveness.

First of all, I would like to thank Rob Nixon, who encouraged me to think of myself as a public intellectual by example and through his consistent emphasis on the craft of writing. For this shaping impact and for the continuing help given since I finished my studies, I am and will always remain deeply grateful.

In addition, I must offer thanks to Jean Franco and Anne McClintock who, along with Edward Said, offered great inspiration to me during my graduate work. I will always be indebted to them for their powerful example as engaged intellectuals and teachers.

Members of Columbia Universitys Postcolonial Collective made the difficult life of a graduate student bearable. In particular, I want to acknowledge the impact of the many late-night conversations I had with Nikhil Pal Singh during these formative years.

While researching this manuscript I benefited from discussions with many members of Britains black and Asian communities. I very much appreciate the willingness of so many to discuss their work and lives with me during the research phase of this project. In particular, I would like to thank Paul Gilroy, Gita Saghal, A. Sivanandan, and Nira Yuval-Davis for speaking to me and, more broadly, for the inspiration they provided me as activists, thinkers, and writers.

I owe a great deal to my colleagues in the Department of English at the University of Iowa, where I was lucky enough to land my first tenure-track job. They provided a model of collegial warmth and conviviality during the stressful early years of my career. I was particularly fortunate to be associated with wonderful mentors such as Dee Morris, Brooks Landon, Philip Lutgendorf, Jael Silliman, and Paul Greenough Page viii during these years. I am also indebted to Iowa for various grantsincluding two Old Gold Summer Fellowships, the Miller Trust Fund Travel Grant, and a Deans Summer Travel Grantthat afforded me travel funding as well as time to research and work on this manuscript.

CUNY, my current home institution, has also generously aided me with relief from teaching through the PSC-CUNY Grant. My thanks to Janet Dudley Ng for her unstinting support as a friend and mentor during my early years at CUNY. More broadly, the militant struggle of colleagues within my home department as well as within my union in general for public higher education has been a tremendous inspiration while I was working on this manuscript.

I would also like to thank the two anonymous reviewers at the University of Michigan Press for their insightful suggestions on an early draft of this manuscript. I am of course to blame for any errors and/or dodgy historical and textual interpretations.

Thanks to extended family members John Dawson, Bernie Small-man, and Jim and Jane Pettit for putting me up in their homes in London during various stages of my research. And to Ann and Nigel Dawson, whose immense and unstinting love during the long years that I worked on this project can never be adequately repaid.

Finally, my deepest thanks go to Patrizia Palumbo and Sofia Palumbo-Dawson for their support and forbearance during this project. This project has grown up with you, Sofia, and yet you and your mother have seldom chided me for the time this twin of yours has taken away from you both. Thank you both for sticking by me to the end.

1. 1 In the Big City the Sex Life Gone Wild
   Migration, Gender, and Identity in Sam Selvons
   The Lonely Londoners
2. 2 Black Power in a Transnational Frame
   Radical Populism and the Caribbean Artists Movement
3. 3 Behind the Mask
   Carnival Politics and British Identity in
   Linton Kwesi Johnsons Dub Poetry
4. 4 Beyond Imperial Feminism
   Buchi Emechetas London Novels and Black British
   Womens Emancipation
5. 5 Heritage Politics of the Soul
   Immigration and Identity in Salman Rushdies
   The Satanic Verses
6. 6 Genetics, Biotechnology, and the Future of
   Race in Zadie Smiths White Teeth
7. Conclusion: Step Back from the Blow Back
   Asian Hip-Hop and Post-9/11 Britain

An Introduction

T HE ICONIC IMAGE OF POST-1945 MIGRATION TO B RITAIN UNWINDS on a grainy old Path newsreel. Standing on the wooden deck of a battered troop carrier named the Empire Windrush as it docks at Tilbury on 21 June 1948, the calypso singer Lord Kitchener offers up a lyrical performance of a song composed specially for the occasion. Lord Kitcheners London Is the Place for Me conveys the immense optimism felt by this initial group of migrants to the colonial metropolis:

London is the place for me

London, this lovely city

You can go to France or America