Bengalis and the Rag Trade

Bengalis and the Rag Trade

This video can only be viewed in libraries

Find your nearest library

The Bengali community around Brick Lane suffers from unemployment as a slump puts small clothing workshops out of business.

1980, and15,000 Bengalis live in London's East End, the majority involved in the semi-skilled end of the manufacture and retail of clothing. A mild winter, an increase in VAT, "bad fashion decisions", and the recession have caused hardship in the industry.
In this edition of London Weekend Television's multicultural series, Skin, Michael Chaplin reports on the impact on the Bengali community of the industry's crisis, and examines the rag trade's long history and its bleak future. Long-term declines in employment in the docks, the breweries and the rag trade leave few prospects for alternative jobs in Tower Hamlets for Bengali Londoners.

15,000 Bengalis live in London's East End, the majority involved in the
manufacture and retail of clothing. A mild winter, an increase in VAT, "bad
fashion decisions" [sic], and the recession have casued hardship in the
industry. Chaplin reports on the effect to the Bengali community, especially
the many women who work on the basic machining.


Tags

From the collection

Multicultural TV

This collection covers programming that emerged from specialist multicultural and Black broadcasting units.
A multicultural Britain was forebodingly cast as an oncoming social issue. Only at the behest of campaigning by the Campaign Against Racial Discrimination (established in 1965) did the programming introduced begin to frame Asian and later Black Britons as part of British society and cater directly to their needs. The earliest examples were programmes broadcast by the BBC Apna Hi Ghar Samajhiye (1965) and Nai Zindagi Naya Jeevan (New Life), which helped improve the English skills of recent Asian migrants. Targeted programming initially emerged regionally, and franchise holders in the midlands who feared the impending reallocation of franchises reacted quickly, leading to multicultural programming such as Here Today, Here Tomorrow (ATV, 1978), Here and Now (Central TV, 1978). In London, London Weekend Television produced Babylon (LWT, 1979), and the London Minorities Unit produced Skin (1980), an extensive focus of our collection. During the emergence of Channel 4, Black programming was in-built into the new channel. Black commissioners, researchers, and presenters emerged, leading to Black and Asian-led series like Black on Black (1982), Eastern Eye (1982), Bandung File (1985), and Black Bag (1985). These programmes catered not only with increasing specificity to their respective audiences but also took on an increasingly globally connective approach centred around acknowledging the intricacy of diasporic relations.

25 videos in this collection

1

Bob Marley

2

Black Actors

3

Attacks on Asians and West Indians

4

Immigration Laws Part 1

5

Bengalis and the Rag Trade

6

Here and Now

7

After the Deptford Fire: A Watershed in British Relations

8

Here and Now

9

Multi-cultural Education

10

Divided Families

11

Football

12

Blues Parties

13

Here and Now

14

Asian Doctors

15

Here and Now

16

25 Years of Black British Part 4

17

Education in Haringey

18

Benjamin Zephaniah, James Berry and Buchi Emecheta at Words to Life (Here and Now)

19

The Deptford Fire

20

Police - Black Relations Part Two

21

Black Churches

22

Immigration Laws Part 2

23

Villain Boroughs

24

Housing in Southall

25

Here and Now

View full collection