This is London
Overall Verdict: ★ ★ ★ ★
Why this book?
Beginning in Victoria coach station, where hundreds of migrants arrive each week, this book takes you on a tour of London centred on the hidden city of illegal workers. As the book travels from the ever-changing Peckham high street via the ‘end of gentrification’ in Neasden to the demolition of tower-blocks and displacement of residents in Elephant and Castle, Ben Judah does not avert the harsh realities of our capital but persists with unashamedly honest story-telling. As a result, the book provides a unique perspective on London and delves into the ‘hidden’ city that many of us simply don’t see.
For students:
Each of us has a different experience of London and each of us is part of one of the myriad different communities that make up our capital city. But how well do we know about the lives of each other? How well do we know about the hidden lives of many Londoners? Reading this book will enlighten and inform as Ben Judah travels from North to South and East to West in search of different stories. This book could be enjoyed alongside studying Changing Places at A-Level, it could be enjoyed simply for your own interest and general knowledge or it could be used as a source for an original coursework project. More ideas of how it could be used for an independent investigation are given below.
For teachers:
For many a geography teacher, teaching the Changing Places topic and guiding students to an independently constructed yet interesting coursework title remain the two most difficult components of teaching A-Level geography. This book aids the teaching of both. Firstly, it provides evocative quotes about a changing London that will resonate with some whilst infuriating others. The quote below is one such example that could be used to discuss the changing identity of London:
“I’m not becoming English… There’s a global culture. It’s very hard to say what’s making someone English. Like cricket and all that? That used to be English… but it’s not anymore. Y’know I feel in London there are so many people here from so many different places they’ve kinda created their own thing here. It’s not like America, where they dismiss anywhere your family is from. London, that allows to embrace where your families is from. But perhaps that’s because English identity is very weak.” (p.190)
Secondly, in each chapter Ben Judah provides a description of the area where the story is being told. Thinking about teaching Changing Places, using one such description would serve as a fascinating starting point for studying an area: to what extent is this description true? To what extent have things changed since 2016? How does this description align with census data and other quantitative data sources about the area?
One such example is this description of Brick Lane:
“The factories had closed. The tannery had folded. The hawkers were shuttering up. And like the Jews, wherever they went he did not know, the Muslims were becoming the strangers, on the tight curve of Brick Lane, between the crowds of drainpipe jeans and bright colours and the whirr of the coffee machines and the thump and tinkle of the beats from the clubs, and his friends from the tannery, they no longer hung around smoking and laughing under the train bridge, fighting sometimes about the coups in Pakistan, but pulled out to Leyton, and Forest Gate to drive minicabs, one by one.” (p.408)
Thirdly, whilst secondary quantitative data is relatively well used in the coursework of many students, secondary qualitative data remains a struggle. In my experience this is largely owing to students simply not knowing where to look. As I read this book, I couldn’t help but think how a splendid piece of work could result from using one of the many ideas, quotes or stories given in this book as a starting point.
Does gentrification really stop at Neasden? If this is true, why is this the case? How could I investigate this further?
“Neasden is where row after row of Victorian London finally ends. The mellow Georgian mansions and little cottage-pie lanes in Shepherd’s Bush have suddenly gone. Harlesden’s endless ladder of cramped, pompous Edwardian terraces, dotted with defunct gin palaces, has given way to bogus Tudor drives. And this is where gentrification ends, too. The English currency of status in this city is Victorian brick- and these niggling suburban semis are far from what the wealthy English dream for in London.” (p.53)
To what extent is this true? Is this really the cause of inter-racial tensions? Why have these changes occurred?
“Look, what’s happening in London, mate… Here’s Tube Zone 1. Used to belong to the rich English. And then there was Tube Zone 2, Whitechapel, Notting Hill, and all the rest of it, that was the old immigrant land. Then there was Zone 3, 4, 5 and whatever. That used to be posh or working-class suburbs. But what’s happening now is Zone 1’s being sold to the Russians, and Zone 2’s being bought by the poshos… pushing the migrants into white land. That’s why there’s beef.” (p.144)
How has Old Kent Road changed since this book was written in 2016? Is the last pub still there? What does it mean to be cockney in 2020?
“Eighteen times I walked up and down the Old Kent Road. And I heard no cockney at all. I found twelve pubs are down to one. The Duke of Kent has become a Nigerian mosque. The Canterbury Arms has become the Afrikiko nightclub. The Frog and Nightgown has been demolished. The Gin Palace, the Green Man, the Dun Cow and the World Turned Upside Down have all gone too.” (p.203)