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Brick Lane is a street in London’s East End and is the center of the city’s Bangladeshi community.  The area began as a center for brick and tile production back in the 16^th century – hence the name.

“As an international city, London is celebrated for its diversity in population. The East End has always been recognised for the wealth of cultures represented. Spitalfields served as a microcosm of this polyglot society, the ‘melting pot’ fusion of east and west. Historically, it has played host to a transient community – primarily for new immigrants”

Over the centuries, this area has seen a number of immigrant populations come and go.  The French Huguenots were the first major group to arrive back in the 17^th century.  The Huguenots came to escape religious persecution and established themselves as skilled silk weavers and started the area’s textile industry.  The next wave came in the 1780s with the Irish.  The Irish came to London to find work and escape the ravages of the Potato Famine.  The Irish brought their Roman Catholic beliefs into a largely Protestant country.  Many Protestants panicked about this new wave of immigrants who were loyal to Rome.  To combat the influx of Catholicism, Lord George Gordon organized a mob to burn down Roman Catholic chapels in the summer of 1780.

Throughout the 19^th century, Brick Lane had established itself as a home for immigrants, outsiders, and dissidents.  It was an area where crime and poverty ran rampant.  In the 1880s, Brick Lane gained further notoriety with Jack the Ripper and the Whitechapel Murders.  Heightened by the media, these string of killings only reinforced the idea amongst the well to do that Brick Lane was an area to be avoided.  Although the circulation surrounding Brick Lane would have prevented many British Londoners from living there, it certainly did not halt the influx of immigrants.

The late 1800s saw a wave of Jewish immigrants arrive from Eastern Europe.  They came to escape the pogroms and brought with them their religious and cultural traditions.  The Jews shaped the face of Brick Lane by establishing synagogues and Jewish run businesses.  Eventually, the Jewish community dispersed but left behind remnants such as Tubby Isaacs cockle stall and the world-famous Brick Lane Beigel Shop (History of Brick Lane, 1).  In the 1970s, refugees from Bangladesh arrived to escape their home country’s war of independence with Pakistan.   Like many immigrant groups before them, the Bengalis brought with them their food, culture, and religion.  Also known as Banglatown, the Bengalis have transformed Brick Lane into what we see today.  The many problems and extreme poverty that once afflicted the area have now gone, and today Brick Lane is more famous for its many curry houses.

IMAGES

Intro | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Conclusion