Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane documents the experiences of Bangladeshi immigrants in London's Brick Lane neighborhood from the 1930s onward. It focuses on the stories of Nazneen and Chanu, who migrate to London in arranged marriages. Nazneen struggles with isolation and domestic duties but eventually gains empowerment through her daughters, an affair, and work. Chanu struggles with racism and feelings of alienation, deciding to return to Bangladesh. The document examines how immigrants and their children negotiate identities and traditions as they adapt to their new home in London.

1. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane

2. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
Background of Immigrant:
Migration started in 1930s
Predominantly Sylheti Phenomenon :
empoloyed by British Ship Companies
Largely illiterate and Landless farmers
Afetr WWW-II, Labor Shortage , British Govt.
encourage migration
In 1950s, Migration increased dramatically

3. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
In 2001, British Bangladeshi Leaders led a
successful bid to gain the official desingation
of “Banglatown” for Brick Lane

4. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
• Centred Around Nazneen and Chanu
Continuous process of Negotiation
And self questioning and through this process
the characters finally succeed to arrive at an
identity that is almost complete in itself.
• The narrative develops around Nazneen:
Migrates to London after an arranged marriage

5. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
Confined with domestic chores
“not beautiful, but not so ugly either. The face
is broad, big forehead. Eyes are a bit too close
together”. (p.22-23).
English was restricted to two words “sorry”
and “thank you”

6. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
“Why should you go out? ‘If you go out, ten
people will say, “I saw her walking on the
street.” And I will look a fool. Personally, I
don’t mind if you go out but these people are
so ignorant. What can you do?” (P-75)

7. • “Why should you go out? ‘If you go out, ten
people will say, “I saw her walking on the
street.” And I will look a fool. Personally, I
don’t mind if you go out but these people are
so ignorant. What can you do?” (P-75)

8. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
Be submissive reminds:
“If God wanted us to ask question, he would
have made us men.”
Silent Protest: hot chilies in sandwiches

9. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
She feels empowered for the first time in
London : A English stanger
Sides her Daughters
Start making Decission
Attend Community Meeting

10. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
 Karim’s sudden entry into her life adds
empowerment
 She also takes up sewing
 Engaged with an affair with Karim

11. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
“BD is the happiest country in the World” (cp-
15)
Refuse to return BD
Refused to marry Karim: Defends his place
because he has no place

12. No longer “Un – Spoilt” village girl
Free to do whatever she liked.
Razia reminds her
-- “This is England. You can do whatever you
like.” (Page-413)
“She waved her arms, threw back her head
and danced around the table […] letting it all
go loose.” (p.489).

13. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
Razia:
“Listen, when I’m in Bangladesh I put on
a sari and cover my head and all that. But
here I go out to work. I work with white girls
and I’m just one of them…Some women spend
ten, twenty years here and they sit in their
kitchen grinding spices all day and learn only
two words of English.” (P-114)

14. Razia:
“Listen, when I’m in Bangladesh I put on
a sari and cover my head and all that. But
here I go out to work. I work with white girls
and I’m just one of them…Some women spend
ten, twenty years here and they sit in their
kitchen grinding spices all day and learn only
two words of English.” (P-114)

15. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
Represented suffering from maladjustment
Being tired of tolerating discrimination he
decides to return to Dhaka
‘And when they jump ship and scuttle
over here, then in a sense they are home again.
And you see, to a white person, we are all the
same: dirty little monkeys all in the same
monkey clan. But these people are peasants.
Uneducated. Illiterate. Close-minded. Without
ambition.’ (Ali, 28)

16. • Chanu:
‘And when they jump ship and scuttle
over here, then in a sense they are home again.
And you see, to a white person, we are all the
same: dirty little monkeys all in the same
monkey clan. But these people are peasants.
Uneducated. Illiterate. Close-minded. Without
ambition.’ (Ali, 28)

17. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
“To be an immigrant is to live out a tragedy”
(page-91)
“ I am talking about the feeling of
alienation engendered by a society where
racism is prevalent.” (page- 92)

18. Finds himself alien
“A set of questions, an array of possibilities,
abd a spark of debate” (Pg- 55)
Moreover, the change that he sees in his two
daughters made him shiver and he began
feeling outsider in his own family.

19. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
 Not listen to Bengali classical music,
wore jeans and hated Salwaar kameez
 “the little memsahib” & “the messenger”

20. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
Shahana and Bibi or Tariq and Shefali
:different perspective of immigrant
experience
Youngsters enjoy the liberties that London
offers them

21. Immigrant Experience in Brick Lane
“Identity Crisis”
Not caused by Nostalgia but their instinct for
Survival

22. Thank You for Having a Look
Mehidi Hasan Mukul
20111104030
M.A , 1st
Semester
Department of English
Session 2015-16
mehidieng@yahoo.com