The Integration Crisis

As an Asian girl growing up in a small town of the county Essex, I was certainly subjected to some discrimination and prejudice. Nowadays racial discrimination has fortunately declined in schools and in public places. Most people, particularly within London, have become more accepting and welcoming towards other people of different ethnic origin. Although with this in mind, there have been growing concerns on certain Asian communities failing to integrate with others. This is more evident within the Bangladeshi and Pakistani communities. People who have travelled from Bangladesh or Pakistan more than 30 years ago would have spent their lives feeling alienated to begin with and could even have been victims of racial abuse. Such incidence would almost certainly be unfamiliar to them, which would leave them unable to deal with the matter effectively due to a language barrier and making them lose confidence in the Western culture. These emotions are likely to be transferred, possibly indirectly, onto their children due to their belief to preserve their culture and raise them to follow the traditions exactly as they had been taught prior to living in the UK. But then this poses a problem for the children who grow up to have an identity crisis. This kind of upbringing can only make cultural divisions more prominent, as the younger generation are taught to believe that their parent’s country of origin is their real ‘home’ when in fact they may have rarely (often never) visited the country. This in turn can cause a lack of cultural integration between the Asian community and the Western culture, which then poses the question of why some Asian communities are lacking in progressing towards diversity and multiculturalism?

The subject of integration particularly within the Bangladeshi community was first raised as an issue in 2002 when David Blunkett announced that Asian families who arrange marriages for their children should look within Britain and not overseas. This was a concern mainly for Asian women who would prefer to marry British born men who are educated. However some people within this community have perceived this claim to be an attempt to tighten the number of immigrants entering into the UK. Yet the problems of Asian families not integrating and preventing their children to integrate seem prominent within certain communities. The Bangladeshi and Pakistani community were mainly targeted concerning these issues, with 90% of them being Muslim. Within the heart of London, in ‘Bangla Town’ Spitalfield and Brick Lane, there is a noticeable division caused by the Bengali community. Brick Lane is an up market area, whereby many people can enjoy a vibrant and trendy social evening together. But the loud music from bars and the buzzing of people conflict with some of the Bengali residents in that area. For some of the elder generation such gatherings have been an unfamiliar concept. The bars that people visit serve alcohol to the public and are therefore prohibited in the Muslim. This in turn keeps the Bangladeshi community away from such places. The younger generation, on the other hand, may feel torn between the Western way of life and their parent’s traditional beliefs. A division of such sort is caused through lack of communication, understanding and feelings of alienation. That which is unfamiliar will be approached with reluctance and vulnerability, but in this case it is not approached causing separation and resentment.