The Aliens’ Registration Bureau’s stigmatising name (Tavistock Square WC1H), became, from
the early 1990s, an identity marker for me, together with the Home Office’s Lunar House
where I received the annual visa each time the BBC renewed my contract. Reporting all day
on the flood of refugees from Bosnia, my treatment as “alien” did not cloud the respect I
enjoyed as a professional. But I knew that even multi-cultural London can marginalise
foreign identities.
BBC World Service offered me invaluable knowledge of the unique immigrant experience of
some of the 42 language speakers working in its studios. Prior to that, my Master’s thesis in
French Surrealist literature (1993, Sofia University) analysed the intertextuality in the
theatre plays of the French/German/Czech/Jewish poet and playwright Yvan Goll. His ‘fluid’
national identity informed his use of theatre metaphors and borrowed prototypes
(Shakespeare, Zola, Brecht). Torn physically between more than one culture during and
between two world wars, Goll used another myth to centre – or send away – his analysts:
‘The Wandering Jew’. A few years later the BBC made an offer for a post in London, based
on my reporting on the controversial creation of an ethnic political party in Bulgaria, the
Movement of Rights and Freedoms.
In the early 2000s I took up an opportunity to teach French to A-level students of many
cultural backgrounds. Presenting a new French A-level syllabus on the Algerian War of
Independence (1954-1962) to my school’s academic society, I put the emphasis on French
Algerians’ fraught relationship with secularism. In 2014 the majority personal and national
histories resulting from this ‘savage war of peace’ (Horne, 1998) lay in classified documents
that today’s French state is still too cautious to open for scrutiny. For the “young ethnics”
(Begag, 2017) of French suburbia – and not only for them – the truth about centuries of
discrimination is coming out too late. Today’s French brand of identity universalism
continues to trigger a sense of injustice in French Algerians whose religious freedoms and
traditions appear diluted in the secular imperative of Frenchness (Wolfreys, 2017).
The History Department at King’s College London welcomed this year a cohort of PGR
students, a number of whom focus their research on aspects of identity. I can only imagine
that in today’s globalised world the connection and exposure to a much larger community in
LAHP would further enrich my own research on post-colonial identity. I hope to offer
participation in seminars, collaborative practice, trips and language support in the
Partnership’s London universities. My interest in learning from the larger academic
community lead me, at the start of my MPhil year in October 2021, to become a member of
the Institute for Historic Research where I participate in their Imperial and World History
Seminar on decolonisation. I have already submitted a paper proposal to a KCL joint
workshop, but I believe such opportunities to be more and further reaching with the
support of a LAHP studentship. The specific LAHP training that interests me, includes further
Research Skills and Methodologies, EDI, Professional Skills and Networking, Public
Engagement and Impact.
My background in radio informed some of my choices of methodology, such as life histories
from podcasts and media programmes. It also offered an opportunity to work on French
Algerian LGBT identity in December 2021. My ability to work for multiple audience types will
expand with the chance to interact with academics and research students at LAHP. This will
improve my research and consolidate its impact on post-colonial and immigrant identity
studies.