SOCIOLOGIST, author and documentary producer Semra Eren-Nijhar has launched her second book at the Cemevi last week.
The Panel was held to discuss the issue of immigration and how it is still on-going.
Head of Haringey Council Ali Gül Özbek, Sociologist Semra Eren-Nijhar, Members of the Enfield Council Doğan Delman and Suna Hurman made up the members of the panel which was held in the conference room of the British Alevi Culture Centre and Cemevi.
The first to speak at the panel was Head of Haringey Council Ali Gül Özbek and thanked Semra Eren-Nijhar for her efforts. He continued the talk by saying: “We are no longer foreigners. I’ve spent most of my life here. How can I be a foreigner? Nobody has the right to call me ‘a foreigner’. I’m from here now. I completed my education here. My children are growing up here and now I’m Head of the council. It would unfair on me if I was to call myself a foreigner.”
Author Semra Eren-Nijhar began the project in the1960s and explained how it stil continues today. “When we look at the statistics the first generation of immigrants feel like foreigners, the second generation may not, but the third and the fourth will feel as though they are in foreign land because of the growing increase of racism.”
Member of Enfield Council Doğan Delman explained how migration still continues today, speaking in regards to the history of England, he highlighted that rates were high particularly in the Middle and East of Europe. The number of refugees coming to England is around 2.5 million. Of course there is migration from the UK to other countries, however I believe that migration will always be something happening.
Enfield Council Member Suna Hurman described her life as an immigrant and how she felt. She said: ‘Foreign land was me being in Turkey when my family was in England, but for my family, it was them being in England because their children were in Turkey at the time. I feel that your motherland is where your family, job and graft is.”
