Alternative spaces of learning in east London : opportunities and challenges

Alternative spaces of learning in east London: opportunities and challenges Raymonde Sneddon and Peter Martin Introduction London, and east London particularly, has been an important site for immigration over the centuries. Prior to the Second World War the major immigrants into the city were Irish, and Polish and Russian Jews (Fishman, 1997; Block, 2005). In the period following the Second World War the demography of London, as well as the linguistic ecology of the city, changed dramatically. The Other Languages of England (Linguistic Minorities Project, 1985) provides a typology of migrations into the country between 1945 and 1982. It describes the migrants that came as political refugees and those that came seeking employment. In the post war years, Britain encouraged immigration, in part to help in the massive reconstruction process that was required. Since the 1990s political changes, persecution and war, famine and other ecological catastrophes, as well as the expansion of the EU, have led to an increase in the movement of peoples from different geographical and political contexts and greatly increased the scale and nature of diversity in London (Vertovec, 2007).