‘Paperwork or no paperwork, we are guests in this country’: mothering and belonging in the wake of the Windrush Scandal

ABSTRACT

The 2018 Windrush Scandal prompted widespread condemnation of the British government’s treatment of older Caribbean migrants. Yet broader questions pertaining to the effects of the scandal on the wider Caribbean community remain underexplored. Given the salient position that Caribbean mothers occupy in the British nation, this article examines narrative interviews with five Caribbean mothers living in London, addressing how the scandal affected their sense of belonging and subsequent mothering strategies. The findings indicate that the scandal is part of a broader repertoire of racialized exclusion instigated by the state, and identifies three mothering strategies deployed as tools of resistance.

KEYWORDS:

• Black Caribbean mothers
• belonging
• mothering
• Windrush Scandal
• Hostile environment
• racial state violence

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their careful reading and useful suggestions for our paper. We would also like to thank Hayley James, Neema Begum, Ron Chan and Amie Kirby for their useful comments on earlier drafts of this paper. We are also extremely grateful to Rubina Jasani and Luke de Noronha for challenging and inspiring our thinking. Finally, we would like to thank the women who participated in this study, who shared their thoughts and experiences, and to whom we are deeply indebted.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. The ‘Hostile Environment’ refers to measures brought in by the 2014 and 2016 Immigration Acts that sought to reduce net migration to Britain, by creating barriers to fundamental services, such as housing and healthcare, for undocumented migrants. The term refers to Theresa May’s pledge in 2012, when as Home Secretary she promised to create ‘a really hostile environment for illegal migration’ (Gentleman 2019, 117).

2. The Windrush Generation refers to the generation of post-Second World War Caribbean migrants, who arrived in Britain between 1948 and 1973 (Gentleman 2019).

Additional information

Funding

The work was not supported by any funding.