It took a while for many Britons to accept the change of the ethnic landscape that developed as black people from the former British colonies arrived in the country after the Second World War. Racism was common and even socially acceptable in some circles, and the situation for immigrants was often difficult. Britain is today a multicultural country with many different ethnic groups, and people have been forced to change their ways.
Benjamin Zephaniah, a British-Jamaican poet from Birmingham, has in many of his poems explored the topic of changing attitudes to race, and he writes particularly well about this in his poem 'Neighbours'.
Read through the poem once on your own, and try to identify the shift of tone in the poem.
Neighbours
I am the type you are supposed to fear
Black and foreign
Big and dreadlocks
An uneducated grass eater.
I talk in tongues
I chant at night
I appear anywhere,
I sleep with lions
And when the moon gets me
I am a Wailer.
I am moving in
Next door to you
So you can get to know me,
You will see my shadow
In the bathroom window,
My aromas will occupy
Your space,
Our ball will be in your court.
How will you feel?
You should feel good
You have been chosen.
I am the type you are supposed to love
Dark and mysterious
Tall and natural
Thinking, tea total.
I talk in schools
I sing on TV
I am in the papers,
I keep cool cats
And when the sun is shining
I go Carnival.
Copyright © Benjamin Zephaniah,
Bloodaxe Books, www.bloodaxebooks.com, 2012