By Kai, student at Southfields Academy, London
My name is Kai, I am 15 years old, and I was one of the pupils from Southfields Academy that attended the Migration Museum Project’s ‘100 Images of Migration’ exhibition at Senate House in October with others from my school to learn more about cultural diversity. Our school try their best to help us learn about different subjects in all kinds of ways; for example by taking us to the exhibition.
We went to the exhibition because in Health and Social Care we are learning about cultural diversity and our teacher thought the Migration Museum Project would be a good idea to help us understand cultural diversity and more. The photograph I liked the most was the one of the Somalian mum and her child as they looked very happy and excited, the picture was taken in Brighton which is a perfect setting to go with their mood. They looked very happy; it made me feel happy to see how excited they were despite their story.
The picture that had the most impact on me is the one of the black guy getting harassed before getting arrested in the race riots that happened in Lewisham; this has an impact on me as I am from a multi-cultured background and see these kinds of events on an almost everyday basis.
I learnt how diverse the UK is and, more specifically, I learnt about diversity within our own classroom through placing sweets on a map to represent where our grandparents and parents had come from. I also learnt how many different cultures there are within England. The images in the exhibition notified me about how diverse our country is and has been throughout history.
“I would recommend this to other groups like ourselves; it benefitted us as we were able to look at how migration has moulded the UK into the way it is today.”
I think people from all backgrounds should see this exhibition and use it to help them understand just how people from different backgrounds have interacted with each other over here in the UK over the years.