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News From Nowhere Radical & Community Bookshop

not-for-profit - a workers'co-op - committed to social justice | 96 Bold Street, Liverpool L1 4HY - 0151 708 7270

Britain's 'Brown Babies'

by Lucy Bland - £12.99  Manchester University Press (2021)
paperback    ISBN 13: 9781526160119 | ISBN 10: 1526160110

This book recounts a little-known history of the estimated 2,000 babies born to black GIs and white British women in the second world war. The African-American press named these children 'brown babies'; the British called them 'half-castes'. Black GIs, in this segregated army, were forbidden to marry their white girl-friends.
 
Nearly half of the children were given up to children's homes but few were adopted, thought 'too hard to place'. There has been minimal study of these children and the difficulties they faced, such as racism in a (then) very white Britain, lack of family or a clear identity. The book will present the stories of over fifty of these children, their stories contextualised in terms of government policy and attitudes of the time.
 
Accessibly written, with stories both heart-breaking and uplifting, the book is illustrated throughout with photographs.

(Price & availability last checked: September 2021)

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In booklists: Bi-Racial / Mixed Race Lives, Black Britain,
In categories: Anti-Racism, Black, Asian & Other Diasporas,

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