Feona Attwood, Professor in Cultural Studies, Communication and Media in the School of Media and Performing Arts, shares her interview with influential sociologist and philosopher Zygmunt Bauman. Zygmunt Bauman, who has died, aged 91, is best known for his analyses of globalization, power and inequality and for his notion of ‘liquid modernity’: the contemporary state […]
via An interview with influential sociologist Zygmunt Bauman — Middlesex Minds
On 31 of January a man was nearly run over in a car park. He could not speak English, but lucky for him, a senior manager of a certain Black Country town cared enough to make sure he was ok. The manager fetched me quickly – the Russian speaking member of his team -and pleaded anxiously- “tell him I am sorry and ask him if he needs anything”
From that moment onwards, Vladimir’s and my lives intertwined. He spoke to me about his political activity in Russia, how he used to be a good friend with late Anna Politkovskaya, the Russian anti-establishment journalist whose murder remains unsolved to this day. He spoke to me of the 1990s, the years full of hope, when he set up an independent newspaper in St. Petersburg, of his acquaintance with Vaclav Havel and Milos Zeman and many other dissidents in Central and Eastern Europe.
He drunk black tea and ate some toasts (he had to stay off cakes being recently diagnosed with diabetes). I helped him to polish his asylum case – which he found so difficult to put together as his English was very weak. I heard all about his substandard accommodation provided by G4S and of his unpleasant flatmates and of the humble £37 he gets very week to support himself of which he attempts to make some ‘savings’.
He told me of his time in exile in Germany, halted by Angela Merkel’s deal with Putin which meant repatriation of all political asylum-seekers back to Russia only recently. And of his difficult return to his homeland which brought nothing else but suspicion and stigma, followed by systematic persecution and bullying by local authorities, Police and courts, denying him pension and citizenship rights. I wondered, what it must take for someone to immigrate again, so late in life – in their 70s. How desperate one has to feel to fight for dignity and freedom after having failed so many times before.
It was another cold snap in Black Country, the Northerly wind was blowing, as they say on the news, with the dandruff type of snow falling all Friday. Vladimir spent the whole morning in a library and then came to see me. He asked if I could call his solicitor . It’s not my job – I could say, but he insisted. He had another appointment at Immigration Office, Leeds and wanted to make sure his paperwork was in order. He wanted his solicitor to accompany him.
I looked at him and he was not his usual self, I could tell, although I only knew him for a while. “You look a bit different”, I said, “your eyes are yellow and so is your face”. He complained of his stomach pain and lack of sleep, profuse sweating and many other ailments. But after a while, we brushed all this under the carpet, being concerned only with his case…we threw ourselves in further paperwork, considering his options.
Until about 4 o’clock when his state has deteriorated and I suggested to take him into an A&E. He resisted it and now I know it was because deep down he must have known. We reported at the reception and luckily the waiting room was relatively empty. The receptionist agreed with me that he was “very jaundiced” and they took us in shortly. There were some women outside laughing – maybe because their suspected diagnoses turned out not to be so detrimental or they simply felt good about the Friday afternoon. We will never know….
The truth is…I had to leave Vladimir there on that Friday evening, barely managing to explain to the medics that he was suffering from a long list of digestive complaints, constipation including. After all, I had to go to the Royal Shakespeare Theatre to see the highly acclaimed 7 Acts of Mercy, never mind I could barely perform only one of them…???
As my weekend progressed and I visited the Swan Theatre in Stratford, my first visit to a theatre in 10 years – my mind was wandering to Vladimir and that little corner in Manor Hospital where they took his bloods ( missing his vein entirely and making a proper mess of it).
Later on in the weekend, after the Sunday roast was cleaned up, the ironing was done and we even managed to talk to our relatives on Skype I had a phone call: “It’s pancreatic cancer”, Vladimir said with repeated hiccups. They said there was nothing they could do. I am kaput”, he concluded. “Could you just bring me the slippers and a laptop from my flat so I can at least watch some Russian movies”.
Silence…followed by silence and then some words of encouragement, instructing him to ask as many questions as possible, not to give up, query the diagnosis, consider the chemo or any other experimental treatment, further investigation, invite an Orthodox priest, contact his family and all the other things we hold on to when someone is faced with a terminal diagnosis.
The clock is ticking and I am wondering whether there are any Russian books in the Walsall Central library. If I should bring him some of mine – Dr. Zhivago may be a bit cliche but what about the Tolstoi’s autobiography I have? Would that be too boring? Or the Quite flows the Don – he may be fed up with all these classics. What movies does he want to see before he dies? Is there anything we can do for him not to die?
There’s some time left – one wonders what to make of it, how to wrap up an unfinished story that seeks justification. How to make sense of this ‘stranger, ‘a wondering soul’ that I have known for so short yet have known so deeply.
My veil with silver threads is lighting up my way
If I was a veiled woman
I’d wrap a purple scarf around me with silver threads.
I’d feel cosy like a child carried around in a blanket.
My weaves lighting up the road before me
like a treacle of chandeliers on a Halloween night.
I would not worry about my hair or make-up.
I’d take my kitchen and attic with me everywhere
and whisper to them as trusted friends, my close relatives…
…about fresh kohlrabi dipped in salt,
about gooseberries, Bulgarian grapes,
about the dark-eyed boy from the fairground
and all the things I knew twenty-five years ago.
If I was a veiled woman I would sing into my ear
about the sky, the warm skin, kind people
and the dome of air that carries me to you –
from Chuckery all the way to Carpathians.
If I was a veiled woman
I’d wrap a purple scarf around me with silver threads.
I’d feel cosy like a child carried around in a blanket.
My weaves lighting up the road before me
like a treacle of chandeliers on a Halloween night.
I would not worry about my hair or make-up.
I’d take my kitchen and attic with me everywhere
and whisper to them as trusted friends, my close relatives…
…about fresh kohlrabi dipped in salt,
about gooseberries, Bulgarian grapes,
about the dark-eyed boy from the fairground
and all the things I knew twenty-five years ago.
If I was a veiled woman I would sing into my ear
about the sky, the warm skin, kind people
and the dome of air that carries me to you –
from Chuckery all the way to Carpathians.
When you have just finished work, picked up your kids and gave instructions for homework, travelling to Digbeth on the tail of M38 traffic does not seem attractive. It was January 26th, the coldest day of the year so far, and ghost factories of inner city Birmingham felt unwelcoming until I reached the Impact Hub with its bright and optimistic spaces.
I must admit, it has been a while since I have attended an academic debate, there’s not been many in the last 10 years raising two children. Understanding Brexit – Inequality, Inclusion and Social Justice was worth it, I thought, after all, Brexit is what keeps me awake at night, worries my friends and clients and I am not even going to mention the Trump-effect. It’s the end of the world as we know it – at least since 1989.
I came a bit late and decided to camp on the carpet by the door as the room was completely packed. The Panel were already discussing the reasons why majority of people voted for Brexit whilst we (the audience that is) all know that Brexit could never possibly solve them. They discussed the migration statistics and various half-truths and lies told by the Brexiters. They went into a lot of depth explaining structural inequalities entrenched in racism since colonisation. They also talked about the rise of fascism, nationalism, xenophobia and white supremacy across the world. We were told by Kehinde Andrews that Britain has always pursued the ‘whiter the better’ model of citizenship.
I am looking around the room – and I wonder, whether I am the only one who thought the debate should also touch on social injustice and exclusion faced by newly settled migrants from very diverse communities – white and non-white who are all EU citizens (some old and some new) and who are having to reconsider their life chances in this country. Many of these people did not have an easy ride – coming from both rural and urban communities devastated by the fall of Soviet Block, austerity or possibly war refugees from around the world who happen to have Italian, French of Dutch citizenship. Worse still, if you are a Roma hated by your neighbourhood with that sneaky feeling you thought you’d never have – that actually, you had it better during the communist era….at least the hate attacks were not as widespread and there was regular work.
These people took a gamble, learnt languages, uprooted their families, kissed good-bye their relatives (whilst still supporting them financially)- and obediently paid taxes for decades in this country, some say, to prop up the generous British welfare system. And it still was hard – their kids were queueing up for school places (waiting for months and years), their genuine intentions (to work and contribute) were constantly questioned, their housing infested, their workers’ rights undermined but that they still kept their loyalties. Of course, it could be worse – they could have been ‘enslaved’…or ‘sexually exploited’ like some of their less fortunate friends. So they persevered.
It troubles me is these people have little voice in debates such is the one hosted by the Impact Hub. They do not know or relate well to the current debates of inequality, discrimination or racism. The old concept of working classes and proletariat versus ‘evil imperialists’ pushed so aggressively during the era of Eastern and Central European socialism is obsolete and unhelpful. The left across Europe is generally going though difficult times, searching new identities and answers.
Yet, we are becoming more and more unequal societies, where migrant workers are on the bottom of food chains and I am afraid that racism discourse – mainly focusing on visible ethnic minorities, does not offer any practical answers. After all, many migrants are voiceless, their contribution invisible and they are resented by all different colours of the spectrum – for taking jobs, marrying for passports and money, for drinking in the street, or sleeping in the park…or just speaking their mother tongue.
So – where does this leave us? I believe that anti-racism movement shouldn’t shy away from exploring different perceptions of racism experienced by people who are officially described as Other White but their culture is portrayed as base, alien, mistrustful, cheating, hugely anti-social and generally inferior regularly by Daily Mail and other media.
The word xenophobia does not always cut it. If one understands European history (East versus West) and even – Euro-Asian history – one finds many shades of racism dividing the continent to Aryans and non-Aryans, Ottomans and Europeans, Slavs versus Germans, Roma versus non-Roma, Jews and non-Jews , commies versus capitalists and Hungarians versus everybody else in Central Europe.
One only needs to look at development of 20th century fascism to realise that many European administrative procedures were racial-ised at one time or other. If one goes further into history and etymology, soon discovers that the word ‘slave’ was inspired by the ethnic label for Slavs who used to be hunted and sold into slavery via Ottoman Empire and Muslim Spain. And yes, I do need to address one wicked problem – as many people assume -that European migrants are themselves racist and therefore have very little understanding 0f ‘the struggle’.
Since I came to UK, I wanted to join several black and minority ethnic networks and my ‘whiteness’ was somehow in the way – ‘this is about visible differences that lead to discrimination‘ I was told. And not long after, the employee network changed its name into a Black Workers’ Group – which made the point absolutely clear.
But I accept – these are valid arguments and we mustn’t ignore the accumulated disadvantage and colonial legacies. And I can’t deny that Eastern Europe has its own horrific issues with racism. But that does not justify the stereotyping, hatred, mistreatment and direct discrimination, perceived as racism, by the victims who happen to be Polish, Moldovan, Italian-Pakistani, Russian, Slovakian or Roma.
We all carry prejudices based on information our brain has been fed (particularly in our early development). It’s a fact now observable through neuroscience experiments. We can be Asian and affluent and have a particularly negative view of Eastern Europeans (the label, by the way, that chucks half the continents’ diverse population into one basket). Or we can be poor and White and have dual heritage kids as our best friends.
So, I disagree that the European project is simply built around the idea of White ‘fortress Europe’ that purposely excludes non-White populations and this is why ethnic minorities voted for Brexit. European countries, like the rest of the world, are experiencing squeeze on resources, squeeze on middle class. Social mobility of our children is threatened. This represents struggle for resources at every level, be it access to education, a decent library, a GP surgery or relatively safe neighbourhood.
Coming out of poverty is extremely hard for those who aren’t able to pull on these resources and public resources are becoming very scarce. The fear is felt mainly by those who think they have a mandate to talk about Britain’s future – White or non-White as opposed to the newcomers who clearly do not have it. Not only do they not have a vote but they also, by their own admission, do not claim any space for any voice because they have tried, for all these years, to keep their head down and be ‘invisible’.
With so many different languages, cultures, political heritages, previous conflicts and wars, Europe has no chance to survive without close cooperation. Europe needs to allow its citizens to move freely to test their stamina, to thrive, to help out poorer regions, to become multilingual, to compete, to try survive. And yes, Europe should reform and become more democratic and reassess many things that have gone wrong.
And every continent should have their own European Union that tries to find the best way to live with their neighbours. Let’s have a multipolar world, where different transnational structures negotiate between themselves to find the best deals for their citizens.
It is a shame that Britain has never fully embraced this concept and is now ‘feeling in the dark’ for some kind of a narrative – of greatness and strength that can hardly ever come from isolating itself from your nearest neighbours.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/apr/21/eu-migrant-uk-referendum-politicians-press
http://discoversociety.org/2016/06/01/racism-in-post-communist-central-europe/
Not a migrant 