Yasmin Alibhai-Brown

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આ વાર્તાના ગુજરાતી અનુવાદ વાંચવા માટે નીચે સ્ક્રોલ કરો'

Yasmin Alibhai-Brown is a British journalist and author, who describes herself as a "leftie liberal, anti-racist, feminist, Shia Muslim, part-Pakistani, and ... a very responsible person".

Currently a regular columnist for The Independent and the London Evening Standard, she is a well-known commentator on issues relating to immigration, diversity and multiculturalism.

She is a founder member of British Muslims for Secular Democracy.

After graduating in English literature from Makerere University in 1972, she left Uganda for Britain,shortly before the expulsion of Ugandan Asians by Idi Amin,See Ugandan Asian Refugee Movement 1972 and completed a Master of Philosophy degree in literature at Linacre College, Oxford, in 1975.

After working as a teacher, particularly with immigrants and refugees, she moved into journalism in her mid-thirties.

Career and views

A journalist on the New Statesman magazine in the early 1980s, Alibhai-Brown now contributes a weekly column to The Independent. She has also written for The Guardian, The Observer, The New York Times, Time magazine, Newsweek and the Daily Mail,and has appeared on the current affairs TV shows Dateline London and The Wright Stuff.

Alibhai-Brown has won numerous awards for her journalism, including the EMMA Media Personality of the Year in 2000, the George Orwell Prize for Political Journalism in 2002 and the EMMA Award for Journalism in 2004. Alibhai-Brown was a research fellow at the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR), a think tank associated with New Labour, from 1996 to 2001,though she ended her connection with the Labour Party over the war in Iraq and other issues, and supported the Liberal Democrats in the 2005 and 2010 general elections.

She is Senior Research Associate at the Foreign Policy Centre,[18] an Honorary Fellow at Liverpool John Moores University and Honorary Visiting Professor at Cardiff and Lincoln Universities.

In the New Year Honours 2001 Alibhai-Brown was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire "for services to journalism".[19] In 2003 Benjamin Zephaniah's public refusal of an OBE inspired her to return the award. She wrote that her decision had been made partly in a growing spirit of republicanism and partly in protest at the Labour government, particularly its conduct of the war in Iraq.

Select bibliography

The Colour of Love: Mixed Race Relationships (with Anne Montague) (1992). London: Virago. ISBN 1-85381-221-8

Racism (Points of View), (with Colin Brown), (1992). Hodder Wayland. ISBN 1-85210-651-4

No Place Like Home (1995). London: Virago. ISBN 1-85381-642-6

True Colours (1999). London: Institute for Public Policy Research. ISBN 1-86030-083-9

Who Do We Think We Are? Imagining the New Britain (2000). London: Penguin. ISBN 0-14-025598-2

After Multiculturalism (2000). London: Foreign Policy Centre. ISBN 0-9535598-8-2

Mixed Feelings: The Complex Lives of Mixed Race Britons (2001). London: Women's Press. ISBN 0-7043-4706-7

Some of My Best Friends Are... (2004). London: Politico's. ISBN 1-84275-107-7

The Settler's Cookbook: Tales of Love, Migration and Food - Paperback – February 4, 2010 Amazon

From Ismaili Mail

Nowhere to belong

Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, writer and journalist, is a fierce fighter against racism and discrimination. She is one of the thousands who had to flee home country Uganda to Britain after Idi Amin’s diktat. It was tough going for her. She never felt at home in Britain and experienced racism at many levels. She was recently in Kolkata, presenting her autobiographical notes in a solo stage performance. Sonali Jha Chatterjee reports

Yasmin Alibhai-Brown’s widely acclaimed autobiography No Place like Home, brought out in 1995, depicts her early life in Uganda.

HER petite frame, unruly curly hair and quick smile belie the fact that this lady is today one of the foremost voices against racism, gender bias and nationalism. Meet 57-year-old Yasmin Alibhai Brown, the only non-white political columnist in a mainstream newspaper, The Independent for the last nine years. Being in a rather unique position as a columnist, she thinks of it as a rather difficult position to be in as “everybody thinks you are on their side and will only represent the good side of the community. A journalist is a journalist is a journalist. Hence, what follows is a lot of clashes over opinions.”

The Iraq war, feels Yasmin, has shown print journalism in its true light. It has come up in a big way and can be properly called the fourth estate, exposing the true face of political powers.

Yasmin was recently in Kolkata stealing the limelight, this time on stage performing a solo act titled Nowhere to Belong, hosted by the British Council, in collaboration with the Indian Council for Cultural Relations. Commissioned by the Royal Shakespeare Society, this performance grew out of a lecture, shaped and changed by a director over a period of six months. Most of her act finds reflection in her autobiography, spanning her years in Uganda and Britain. She admits that this show has been a defining moment in her life.

Back in school, Yasmin’s teachers thought she should be an actress since she had been acting a lot since the age of five. Shakespeare always had a special place in her heart. It was while playing Juliet in school, that brought about a dramatic change in Yasmin’s life. She committed the ‘sin’ of kissing Romeo, played by a black man, on stage. This severed her ties with her father and strained relations with the other relatives. The anguish is brought out in this performance.

Born into the Ugandan-Asian community in 1950, Yasmin belongs to the Ismaili sect. She describes her family as “a lower middle class family in Uganda. My dad did jobs and didn’t, but my mother worked and supported us—later my brother. So we were living on borrowed time.”

After gaining her degree in English literature from Makerere University in 1972, Yasmin left Uganda for Britain in June that year, to pursue M.Phil at Oxford University. A couple of months later, Idi Amin issued an expulsion order that forced the mass migration of Ugandan-Asians.

This marked a defining moment in her life, and a basis for her future work involving race and identity. Her pain on leaving the only home she knew is evident when she says, “Leaving Uganda, having to make a new life in Britain, realizing it was my home but it was not my home, having children in a country where they’d belong much more than I would ever will. I have been constantly fighting and arguing with my new country.”

Very simply, she calls herself ‘a philistine’. Britain has changed a lot since she arrived but she finds much of the British attitude remains the same. “In Britain”, she says, “it’s important to know who is British and who is not. The subtleties are always there.”

Yasmin worked as a teacher for more than 10 years. She then moved on to working with refugees, teaching them language and survival skills. She admits that she always had a strong passion for the dispossessed. At 35, she embarked on a career as a journalist and has been going strong for the past 22 years. She has written for The Guardian, New Statesman, The New York Times, and Newsweek, amongst others. She has worked on numerous radio and television programmes, producing documentaries for Channel 4 and the BBC.

Her widely acclaimed autobiography No Place Like Home, in 1995, shows the dichotomy of her early life in Uganda. She agrees that unlike in South Africa where the people worked together against apartheid, “in east Africa, we had a split personality”. On the one hand, “we loved Gandhi and Nehru and were happy that India was independent but we also cried when Uganda became independent”. She calls her kind ‘rather schizoid’.

In 1999, Yasmin published True Colours, which dealt with political leadership and their attitude to racial minorities. It called on the British government to be proactive towards combating racism. She was therefore amazed to receive a call from the PMO telling her that the Prime Minister would like to launch her book, and so it was.

Some of her works include Who Do We Think We Are: Imagining the New Britain, After Multiculturalism, The Colour of Love: Mixed Race Relationships, Mixed Feelings and Some of my Best Friends Are. She has won several prestigious awards including the BBC ASIA Award for Achievement in Writing 1999, the Commission for Racial Equality Special Award for Outstanding Contribution to Journalism 2000, EMMA Media Personality of the Year 2000 and the George Orwell Prize for Political Journalism 2002.

In India, she is saddened to see that like Britain, here too there is a sense of deference among people for the rich. But her heart leaps up with joy on seeing school students here because she says they know how to behave. In Britain, they behave, dress and talk very rudely. Yasmin feels her 13-year-old daughter would gain a lot if she were to study in India.

She is currently working on a historical food memoir beginning on the Malabar coast. It is through the journey of food from 60 AD that Yasmin will be looking at the migration of people from Gujarat and Kutch who were taken as indentured labourers to Africa and the rest of the world. — TWF

Tribune India

A taste of my past- From the Guardian

I fly into Heathrow from Entebbe in March 1972 feeling blessed by the angels. I am about to start postgraduate studies at Oxford and marry my own True Love (TL), who has been there a year. He is a zoologist, embarked on a DPhil recording the reproductive habits of voles in Wytham Woods. I don't know what voles are. They look like rats in his photos. But heck, it is Oxford. Until we were disabused, we believed England was an orderly, genteel haven, the antithesis of African mayhem.

On the flight over, the plane is packed with Asians who consider themselves unbelievably lucky. Life for Asians in Uganda has become perilous; my fellow passengers have fled before they were pushed. Wise philosopher-housewives calm distressed ladies. Tupperware boxes are passed round containing samosas, dhal bhajias, home-made mithai, fried mogo, bright chutneys that inevitably drip. I smile stupidly, shake my head, then rudely turn away to the window.

I am not quite one of them, or so I pretend even though my mum makes the same snacks at home. I fear I will smell of garlic and ginger when my TL kisses me. My mouth must be peppermint-sweet when it meets his. What they don't know is I have two boxes of snacks for the ride. One contains hot cashews, picked and roasted at a farm in Mombasa, the other cocothende, a fabulous biscuit covered in a layer of sugary crust you first suck off slowly. Our very own Danish pastry.

Cocothende 4 cups (560g) plain flour 1 cup (170g) semolina 1 tsp baking powder ¼ tsp ground cardamom (optional) 1 cup (175g) desiccated coconut 1 tbsp hot oil ¾ cup (175ml) water, as hot as you can bear it Oil for deep frying 1½ cups (350ml) water 2 cups (400g) granulated sugar

Mix dry ingredients, then rub in hot oil. Add water; knead into a pliable dough. Shape into a large rope, divide into small sausages, then indent with three fingers. Place on a clean cloth and leave for an hour covered with another cloth. Heat oil in a fryer; cook until golden brown. Return to cloths to soak up oil. Meanwhile, boil water and sugar; simmer for 15-25 minutes until syrup is stringy. Remove from heat and quickly dip in pastries. Whip out, then leave to cool.

We land. I rush to get away first. My TL is waiting, leaning over the barrier. I am wearing a black velvet dress with pearl buttons, short enough to show six inches of thigh. He is still gorgeous - that manly jaw, that aristocratic nose, those liquid brown eyes. I am not at all pretty, or so they always said, the kind worshippers in our mosque. But I am smart and funny. At 17, I nabbed the best-looking guy in town.

I can't remember the first embraces, kisses, tears and laughter as I rush to my TL and lose myself in vaporous joy. I have been transported to London, the capital of the world, to my future husband with whom I will discover Oxford, the heart of greatness. Kampala hardly matters. That small-town life under the hot sun recedes, will not be missed all that much in those first years.

My memories of growing up in the early 50s in East Africa are too vivid to be entirely accurate. We lived in a tiny flat above the marketplace in Kampala. Home life seemed infused with despair, the misery of misfits. My primary school was where I found my voice and spirit far away from the heat and dust of my parents' crumbling marriage. I entered secondary school as the crosswinds wafted over op art, Twiggy, the Beatles, Blue Hawaii. My hormones were rocking, and it didn't take long for me to throw myself into teenage angst and daring romance. I got myself a real boyfriend, Vinod, who didn't look much like Cliff or Paul McCartney but still was a catch. I also got the part of Juliet for a British Council drama competition, with the Capulets played by Asians and the Montagues by African pupils. Romeo was John Abwole, a graceful, idealistic young black man with treacly eyes. The dangerous truth was that we touched and kissed on stage. Remember, I existed in that space between superior whites and the beasts of burden - you did not reach across to touch black skin or kiss black lips or give your heart to a black man. Even in a school play.

Vinod, the cool boyfriend, was Tybalt, and thus the tension between Romeo and Tybalt was as real as that between the Montagues and Capulets.

Our play won first prize and that incredible evening a teacher drove me home. As I entered the dimly lit living room, I saw a crowd of people - my mother, my father, my brother and his wife - whose faces were hard as granite. There followed a frightful beating. I still carry some marks. My crime? Romeo was black. They called me a vaishia, a slut, a polluter of their good name. My father didn't hit me, but he never spoke to me again.

I couldn't breathe at home, so choked up was I with tension. Yet at school I attained the highest A-level arts grades in the country, so was awarded a scholarship to go to university. Immediately after, destiny delivered to me my own TL, in the back of a car belonging to his good friend Diamond. I was iridescent with happiness, high on success. Like a ripe and ready piece of fruit, I must have exuded a powerful, beckoning aroma. My TL bit.

He was already at Makerere University and I joined the literature department. I was intellectually stimulated like never before, surrounded by friends, music, books and drama, and truly in love. I gave myself to TL one hot afternoon, in my second year there, in his room in a hall of residence.

Food was terrible. Precious homemade pickles made it edible. Jena, my mother, sent over jar after jar of her marmaladey mango concoction, a favourite among Asians and also African students who had not been exposed to Asian cooking. They loved it so much, they stole many of my jars.

Hot mango marmalade 1lb (450g) unripe large green mangoes 280ml water 1½ cups (300g) granulated sugar 5 cloves 4 sticks cinnamon 1½ tsp chilli powder ½ tsp salt

Grate the mangoes and boil in water for six minutes. Drain fruit; return water to pan, add sugar, cloves and cinnamon, and cook until sticky. Add mangoes and carry on stirring and cooking until thick. Stir in chilli powder and salt; cook for a couple more minutes. Cool and store in sterilised airtight jars.

Away from campus, the mood was bleak. Independence had arrived in 1962 - the Union Jack quivered down the pole and the Ugandan flag, with its chirpy crested crane, was raised. But Milton Obote, the new prime minister, turned out to be an unsafe pair of hands. Using his willing general Idi Amin, Obote launched a reign of imprisonment, torture and killings of dissenters.

One day, Obote's secret police broke into our family home. My brother was arrested, taken off in his pyjamas to some unknown destination. No reason was given. A deportation order was handed over. The entire family was to leave forthwith.

By this time my father was deeply depressed and barely functioning. Leaving me in Makerere, the family few to London and shortly after a letter arrived. Papa was dead, suddenly. We had never been reconciled. I was numb and had to pretend sorrow I couldn't yet feel. I flew to London to bury a man who'd made me but couldn't be a father.

In Makerere in January 1971, I opened the yellow cotton curtain of my small room in college one morning and a baby bat fell on the floor, dead. Sophie, my roommate the previous year, rushed in: "Yasmin, stay in, stay in, don't go anywhere. The military has taken over - Obote is out."

Loretta, a brilliant English undergrad, rushed in holding a knife. She said she wanted to kill herself before soldiers killed her. The bat stopped her. She saw it and screamed like she was being murdered. We threw it over the balcony and it fluttered down through the silence outside, thick as fog. The next day there was rejoicing in the streets. Obote was out, the man of the people Idi Amin was in.

Amin turned up at Makerere at graduation time. Dressed in full academic gear, he insisted on conducting the ceremony. TL (who had passed with first class honours) had to kneel in front of the hulk and get his blessings. Students who tried to walk out were roughly pushed back by soldiers.

One of TL's external examiners was the zoologist John Phillipson, who offered him the chance to study for a DPhil in Oxford under his supervision. My future in-laws were elated. Then the state stepped in. TL was told by his African department head (who admired Amin) that he had no right to sweep off to Britain when his own country needed science graduates. We realised TL would have to get out before they took away his passport.

As soon as he was gone, the night raids started. One night they took Esther and her twin, Mary, students of agriculture. Esther came back a week later, shuf...#64258;ing painfully and unwilling to talk. Both sisters had been taken to the nearby barracks to be gang-raped until the soldiers grew bored.

In March 1972 I got my results: first class honours, one of the best they had ever had in literature at Makerere. There was no one to celebrate with. Uganda was a graveyard filling up. As the day of my departure approached, I believed I'd one day come back and teach here, and that Amin's reign of terror would soon self-destruct. I had not the slightest sense that this was a final parting from who I was and the history that had made me.

And so I arrived in London. In the days that followed the ecstatic reunion with TL, I came down to earth. The country was smaller, meaner and colder than I ever imagined it would be. Bitter industrial unrest had resulted in a three-day week and power cuts. Everybody was angry. Enoch Powell was the hero of the white working classes.

In June I married TL. I was 22, TL 23. Plenty grown up already, said the elders; too early, I now think. I could please TL in bed all right but couldn't cook. I set about learning the basics from my mother over the phone. I have it still, my red hardback notebook with the first simple dhal recipes and a dozen ways to make spicy potatoes.

Dry potato curry Serves 4

1 tbsp sunflower oil 1 tbsp sesame seeds 2 tsp cumin seeds 1 dried chilli 1 tsp turmeric 1 cup (about 250g) diced, boiled, peeled potatoes 2 cloves garlic, chopped into slices A little sugar, salt and citric acid 2 tbsp desiccated coconut

Heat oil and cook seeds, chilli and turmeric for two minutes, then stir in potatoes and garlic. Stir-fry over low heat, then add remaining ingredients. Stuff into pitta bread, adding yogurt and cucumber slices.

The land I had left behind imploded within three months. On 5 August Idi Amin announced he had decided to banish British Asians from his country and take over their businesses, lands and possessions. He gave them 90 days to pack up and go.

The arrival in Britain of unwanted Ugandan Asians hastened the decline of prime minister Edward Heath and national disintegration. At the airports, Asians clutching their children and a few belongings were welcomed by lines of "patriots" with obscene placards. In Ealing, where my family lived, a small mosque was opened in a back street. During those early years this was packed out.

Bit by bit, TL and I withdrew from these people, no longer our people, the huddled masses. In Oxford, supremely detached from all reality, we believed we could abandon our past identities as we did our old clothes, homemade and embarrassing. Here we were, a married Asian couple surrounded by wild sex, drugs and rock'n'roll. We declined the drugs and excessive drink but barely a year after our marriage TL confessed he had been spending an awful lot of time on a filthy mattress with a sexy woman with long hair who wore calico, didn't wash that much and lived in a squat. Her feral sex consumed him for a while. I can't blame him. We had no compass. The past was not even another country; it had been dissipated, and we were in a place without restraint.

In 1973, I got pregnant and we decided on an abortion. We had no money to raise a child, and were changing so fast we barely knew ourselves. TL took off his ring; I didn't show him I minded. I worked all hours, passed the MPhil exams, showed the supercilious dons who had so little faith in me.

TL's research on voles went on and on. With no confidence that I could do something with the MPhil, I taught English to foreign students.

In 1977, we agreed it was time for a baby. TL got a job teaching biology at a private school for boys. None of us had planned it, but my mother Jena had more or less joined our household. Our child was born on the coldest day of the year, 30 January 1978. We called him Karim. TL seemed besotted.

Three months after Karim was born, TL got a lectureship at Bedford College, University of London. Within weeks I, too, had a job, teaching English as a foreign language at a private school. Then, three weeks before Karim's first birthday, in January 1979, my cousin offered us a flat to buy in Ealing Common. TL said the place had potential, I was less enthusiastic. Jena hated it but stayed. I still live there; it gives me a sense of continuity.

On warm summer days, I used to take my boy to the college in Regent's Park where TL taught zoology. He would show off his son to adoring students and at times introduce me as well. Never, though, to a tall, shapely young woman with a square jaw and a cascade of wavy golden hair down to her waist who was often just leaving his office.

The old talk of open marriages had started up again. Why did I agree? Was I so desperately in love I couldn't deny TL anything? Was I plain stupid?

TL always made sure I knew when he was going to visit the blonde. I caught the whiff of her on him, and blond hairs twinkled on his clothes, but I behaved impeccably. As TL became more entangled in Rapunzel's hair, I went to work for the Inner London Education Authority, teaching English and job skills to immigrants and refugees.

When TL confessed he felt trapped in his job and wanted to become an acupuncturist, we agreed I would try to write freelance articles, so we could manage the finances and pay for his course and equipment. For three years he would be going off virtually every Friday, returning Sunday evening.

My first journalistic breaks came through: an article published in the Guardian, another in New Society, contract work at the BBC. At eight, Karim, smart and super-confident, passed the entrance exams for the best public school in London.

Jena had moved to a small council flat near us. Karim was always there, after school, and she made him roti, puri and pudla - yellow pancakes made of gram flour, one of the best Indian snacks ever.

Pudla

1lb (about 450g) gram flour 2 spring onions, finely chopped 1 tsp ajwainseeds (or broken cumin seeds) ½ bunch finely chopped fresh coriander ½ tsp chilli powder (or 1 finely chopped green chilli) 1 tsp salt and ½ tsp black pepper A pinch asafoetida 1¼ pt (700ml) water

Mix ingredients, then add water to make a batter. Leave to rest for an hour. Heat flat griddle or frying pan; spread a little oil on it. Pour in a little of the mix and spread it out with a wooden spatula so it thinly covers the pan. Cook for about a minute, then turn over. Serve with yogurt, pickles or chutneys.

I gave up my teaching job and joined New Society. I was elated. On 20 December 1987, I bought tickets for us all to see The Wizard Of Oz at the Barbican. The next morning TL brought me coffee and blurted out that he had never stopped seeing Rapunzel and that he was tormented, confused, suicidal even, hated himself more than I could imagine. I remember a flash and brief blackout; all my organs seemed to collapse into my stomach.

There followed more weeks of torment as TL vacillated between leaving and staying. I finally told him to go. The act had gone on too long; the play needed to end. I was exhausted.

The days and nights that followed passed in a natural or induced coma, interrupted by violent outbreaks of emotion. TL's guilt and shame were replaced by a militant sense of entitlement towards our son. After a number of exhausting rows, I told TL that Karim was mine, that I would manage the money and the care. I would never ask him for any help. I never did; I never have.

Four months after TL left, in April 1988, at Bristol Temple Meads station, I looked into the face of a man and was enchanted. He was Colin Brown, a race researcher at the Policy Studies Institute. He had written a book, Black And White Britain, that was on my desk, but in my head the author was a middle-aged, radical Caribbean man, not this boyish white bloke. We had both been invited to Bristol to take part in a BBC TV debate on race, and were in the taxi queue. We had drinks and talked as if continuing a conversation we had started a long time back. We were ideological soul mates.

I chose to share my life with an Englishman, and that shocked many of my old equality warriors: I was sleeping with the enemy. I was now at the New Statesman and Society, an amalgam that never worked. I hated the job, the atmosphere was ruthlessly misogynistic and, as the Satanic Verses row broke out, I realised there was among many of my peers a gross intolerance of Muslims. I was then the only person in the mainstream press who came from a Muslim background, and came out as a Muslim at this time, just when the row turned into a war of words between liberal fundamentalists and fanatics. It was a political label, embraced for political reasons and, I think, because of innate loyalty. I left, and felt this absurd sense of liberation.

In November 1990, my decree nisi came through, and three days later, after apparently plotting with Karim, Colin proposed to me.

A year after our wedding, I conceived. It was not planned, but suddenly a new desire surged. We wanted a baby. There were two miscarriages, one after another at around 12 weeks, followed by inconsolable sadness. Then, after a holiday, a third pregnancy was confirmed, and on 11 April 1993, my girl was born. Jena was ecstatic: another grandchild to nurture and bathe, sing to and spoil.

In 1994, I was pulled back to the old continent for the first time since I had left. The drive from Entebbe airport to Kampala seemed so familiar, I felt I had never left. Within two days I was a mess. My home town was slummed down; bullet holes and wrecked buildings reproached the eyes. The biggest shock was Makerere, so dilapidated I cried. I rushed back to London, acutely distressed. My country was gone, memories burned away in the violent years.

The human urge to trace bloodlines is strong. But our far past was swept away. Like many other East African Asians whose forebears left India in the 19th century, I search endlessly for the remains of those days. Then Africa disgorged us, too, and here we are, people in motion, now in the west, the next stopover. There is no place on earth we can historically and unequivocally claim to be ours.

In the autumn of 2007 Gordon Brown made his first prime ministerial speech at the Labour party conference. He used the word Britishness about 78 times. His patriotic whacks gave me a headache. What the future holds seems as uncertain as ever. Perhaps I should keep a suitcase half-packed. Just in case.

* This is an edited extract from The Settler's Cookbook: A Memoir Of Love, Migration And Food by Yasmin Alibhai-Brown

યાસ્મીન અલભાઈ-બ્રાઉન એક બ્રિટિશ પત્રકાર અને લેખક છે, જે પોતાની જાતને "ડાબેરી ઉદારવાદી, જાતિવાદી વિરોધી, નારીવાદી, શિયા મુસ્લિમ, ભાગ-પાકિસ્તાની, અને ... ખૂબ જવાબદાર વ્યક્તિ" તરીકે વર્ણવે છે.

હાલમાં ધ ઇન્ડિપેન્ડન્ટ અને લંડન ઇવનીંગ સ્ટાન્ડર્ડ માટેના એક નિયમિત કટારલેખક, તે ઈમિગ્રેશન, વિવિધતા અને બહુસાંસ્કૃતિકવાદના મુદ્દાઓ પર જાણીતા ટીકાકાર છે.

તે સેક્યુલર ડેમોક્રસી માટે બ્રિટિશ મુસ્લિમોના સ્થાપક સભ્ય છે.

1 9 72 માં મેકરેરે યુનિવર્સિટીમાંથી અંગ્રેજી સાહિત્યમાં સ્નાતક થયા બાદ, યુગાંડાયન એશિયનોના ઇડી અમીન દ્વારા હટતાં પહેલાં યુગાંડાને યુગાંડાયન એશિયન રેફ્યુજી ચળવળ 1972 માં જોવા મળ્યું હતું અને ઓક્સફોર્ડના લિનક્રે કોલેજમાં સાહિત્યમાં માસ્ટર ઓફ ફિલોસોફી ડિગ્રી પૂર્ણ કરી હતી. 1975

એક શિક્ષક તરીકે કામ કર્યા પછી, ખાસ કરીને ઇમિગ્રન્ટ્સ અને શરણાર્થીઓ સાથે, તેણી મધ્ય ત્રીસાનીમાં પત્રકારત્વમાં રહેવા ગયા

કારકિર્દી અને મંતવ્યો

1980 ના દાયકાની શરૂઆતમાં ન્યૂ સ્ટેટસમેન સામયિકના પત્રકાર, અલિભાઇ-બ્રાઉન હવે ધ ઇન્ડિપેન્ડન્ટમાં એક સાપ્તાહિક સ્તંભ ફાળવે છે. તેણીએ ધી ગાર્ડિયન, ધ ઓબ્ઝર્વર, ધ ન્યૂ યોર્ક ટાઇમ્સ, ટાઈમ મેગેઝિન, ન્યૂઝવીક અને ડેઇલી મેઇલ માટે પણ લખ્યું છે, અને વર્તમાન બાબતોના ટીવી શોમાં ડેટીલિન લંડન અને રાઈટ સ્ટુફ શો છે.

અલભાઇ-બ્રાઉને 2000 માં ઇએમએમએ મીડિયા પર્સનાલિટી ઓફ ધ યર, 2002 માં રાજકીય પત્રકારત્વ માટે જ્યોર્જ ઓરવેલ પુરસ્કાર અને જર્નાલિઝમ માટે 2004 માં ઇએમએમએ એવોર્ડ સહિતના પત્રકારત્વ માટે અસંખ્ય પુરસ્કારો જીત્યા છે. એલિભાઇ-બ્રાઉન સંસ્થામાં સંશોધન સાથી હતા. 1996 થી 2001 સુધી ન્યૂ લેબર સાથે સંકળાયેલી એક વિચારવાદી પબ્લિક પોલિસી રિસર્ચ (આઇપીપીઆર) માટે, જોકે તેણે ઇરાક અને અન્ય પ્રશ્નોના યુદ્ધ ઉપર લેબર પાર્ટી સાથે જોડાણ બંધ કર્યું અને 2005 અને 2010 ના સામાન્ય વર્ષમાં લિબરલ ડેમોક્રેટ્સને ટેકો આપ્યો હતો. ચૂંટણી

તે ફોરેન પોલિસી સેન્ટર ખાતે સિનિયર રિસર્ચ એસોસિયેટ છે, [18] લિવરપુલ જ્હોન મૂરેસ યુનિવર્સિટીના માનદ સાથીદાર અને કાર્ડિફ અને લિંકન યુનિવર્સિટીઓમાં માનદ વિઝિટ પ્રોફેસર.

ન્યૂ યર ઓનર્સ 2001 માં અલીભાઈ-બ્રાઉનને "પત્રકારત્વ માટેની સેવાઓ માટે" ઓર્ડરના બ્રિટિશ સામ્રાજ્યના સભ્ય તરીકે નિમણૂક કરવામાં આવી હતી. [19] 2003 માં બેન્જામિન ઝેફાનિયાએ ઓબીઇ (OBE) ના જાહેર ઇનકારથી તેમને આ એવોર્ડ પરત કરવાની પ્રેરણા આપી. તેણીએ લખ્યું હતું કે તેના નિર્ણયને અંશતઃ પ્રજાસત્તાકવાદના વધતા ભાવમાં અને અંશતઃ શ્રમ સરકારમાં વિરોધમાં કરવામાં આવ્યો હતો, ખાસ કરીને ઇરાકમાં યુદ્ધના તેના વર્તન.

ઇસ્માઇલી મેલથી નોવ્હેરનું પાલન કરવું યાસ્મીન અલભાઈ-બ્રાઉન, લેખક અને પત્રકાર, જાતિવાદ અને ભેદભાવ સામે તીવ્ર ફાઇટર છે. તે હજારો પૈકી એક છે, જે ઈડી અમીનના આદેશ પછી ઘરેલુ દેશ યુગાન્ડાથી બ્રિટનમાં ભાગી જવું પડ્યું હતું. તે તેના માટે ખડતલ રહ્યું હતું બ્રિટનમાં ઘરે ક્યારેય એવું લાગ્યું નહોતું કે ઘણા સ્તરોમાં જાતિવાદ અનુભવે છે. તેણી તાજેતરમાં કોલકાતામાં એક આત્મકથનાત્મક પ્રદર્શનમાં તેણીની આત્મચરિત્રાત્મક નોંધો પ્રસ્તુત કરતી હતી. સોનલ ઝા ચેટર્જીએ અહેવાલ આપ્યો

યાસિન અલભાઈ-બ્રાઉનની વ્યાપકપણે પ્રશંસા કરાયેલ આત્મચરિત્ર નો પ્લેસ જેમ હોમ, 1995 માં બહાર પાડવામાં આવ્યું, યુગાન્ડામાં તેણીની પ્રારંભિક જીવન દર્શાવે છે.

તેના પિટાઇટ ફ્રેમ, બેકાબૂ વાંકી વાળ અને ઝડપી સ્મિત હકીકત એ છે કે આ મહિલા આજે જાતિવાદ, જાતિ પૂર્વગ્રહ અને રાષ્ટ્રવાદ સામેના અગ્રણી અવાજો પૈકીના એક છે. છેલ્લા નવ વર્ષથી ધ ઇન્ડિપેન્ડન્ટ, મુખ્યપ્રવાહના અખબારમાં 57 વર્ષીય યાસમિન અલભાઈ બ્રાઉન, એક માત્ર બિન-ગોરા રાજકીય કટારલેખકને મળો. એક કટારલેખક તરીકેની જગ્યાએ એક અનન્ય સ્થિતીમાં હોવાના કારણે, તે એમ વિચારે છે કે, "દરેક વ્યક્તિ વિચારે છે કે તમે તેમની બાજુ પર છો અને ફક્ત સમુદાયની સારી બાજુનું પ્રતિનિધિત્વ કરશે. પત્રકાર એક પત્રકાર છે, પત્રકાર છે. તેથી, અભિપ્રાયો ઉપર ઘણાં અથડામણો છે. "

ઇરાક યુદ્ધ, યાસમિન લાગે છે, તેના સાચા પ્રકાશમાં પ્રિન્ટ પત્રકારત્વ દર્શાવે છે. તે મોટા પાયે આવે છે અને યોગ્ય રીતે ચોથું એસ્ટેટ તરીકે ઓળખાય છે, જે રાજકીય સત્તાના સાચા ચહેરાને ખુલ્લું પાડે છે.

યાસમિન તાજેતરમાં કોલકાતામાં પ્રસિદ્ધિને ચોરી કરી હતી, આ સમયે સ્ટેજ પર નોવરેથી બેલોંગ નામના સોલો એક્ટનું આયોજન કરવામાં આવ્યું હતું, જે બ્રિટીશ કાઉન્સિલની હોસ્ટેડ દ્વારા યોજવામાં આવ્યું હતું, જે ઈન્ડિયન કાઉન્સિલ ફોર કલ્ચરલ રિલેશન્સ સાથે મળીને કામ કર્યું હતું. રોયલ શેક્સપીયર સોસાયટી દ્વારા અમલ કરાયેલ, આ અભિનય છ મહિનાના સમયગાળામાં ડિરેક્ટર દ્વારા વ્યાખ્યાન, આકારના અને બદલાયું છે. તેમની મોટાભાગની કૃત્ય તેની આત્મકથામાં પ્રતિબિંબ પાઠવે છે, જે યુગાન્ડા અને બ્રિટનમાં તેના વર્ષોનો ફેલાવો કરે છે. તેણીએ કબૂલે છે કે આ શો તેમના જીવનમાં એક વ્યાખ્યાત્મક ક્ષણ છે.

સ્કૂલમાં પાછા, યાસ્મીનના શિક્ષકોએ વિચાર્યું કે તે એક અભિનેત્રી હોવી જોઈએ કારણ કે તે પાંચ વર્ષની ઉંમરથી ઘણો અભિનય કરતો હતો. શેક્સપીયર હંમેશા તેના હૃદયમાં વિશેષ સ્થાન ધરાવે છે. તે શાળામાં જુલિયટ રમી રહ્યો હતો, જે યાસ્મીનના જીવનમાં નાટ્યાત્મક ફેરફાર લાવ્યો. સ્ટેજ પર, એક કાળા માણસ દ્વારા ભજવવામાં રોમિયોને ચુંબન કરવા માટે તેણે 'પાપ' કર્યું. આ તેના પિતા સાથેના સંબંધોને નાબૂદ કરી અને અન્ય સંબંધીઓ સાથે સંબંધો તોડી નાખ્યો. આ પ્રદર્શનમાં કઢાપો બહાર લાવવામાં આવ્યો છે

1950 માં યુગાન્ડા-એશિયન સમુદાયમાં જન્મેલા, યાસ્મીન ઇસ્માઇલી સંપ્રદાયના છે. તેણીએ પોતાના પરિવારને "યુગાન્ડામાં મધ્યમ વર્ગનું નીચું કુટુંબ ગણાવે છે. મારા પપ્પા નોકરી કરે છે અને નહીં, પણ મારી માતાએ કામ કર્યું અને અમને ટેકો આપ્યો - પછીથી મારા ભાઇ તેથી અમે ઉધાર સમય પર જીવતા હતા. "

મેકરેરે યુનિવર્સિટીમાંથી 1 9 72 માં અંગ્રેજી સાહિત્યની ડિગ્રી મેળવ્યા બાદ, યાસમિન ઓક્સફોર્ડ યુનિવર્સિટીમાં એમ.ફિલનો પીછો કરવા માટે, તે વર્ષે જૂનમાં યુગાન્ડા બ્રિટનને છોડી દીધી. થોડા મહિનાઓ પછી, ઇદી અમીને હકાલપટ્ટીના હુકમનામું બહાર પાડ્યું હતું જેણે યુગાન્ડેન-એશિયનોનો સમૂહ સ્થળાંતર કરવાની ફરજ પડી હતી.

તેના જીવનમાં એક વ્યાખ્યાત્મક ક્ષણને ચિહ્નિત કરવામાં આવ્યું હતું, અને તેના ભાવિ કાર્ય માટે રેસ અને ઓળખને લગતી કામગીરીનો આધાર. યુગાંડા છોડીને, બ્રિટનમાં નવું જીવન બનાવવાની સાથે, તે મારા ઘરની અનુભૂતિ કરતો હતો, પરંતુ તે મારા ઘરમાં ન હતું, જ્યાં તે દેશના બાળકો હતા જેમની પાસે તેઓ હતા હું ક્યારેય કરશે ક્યારેય કરતાં વધુ હું સતત મારા નવા દેશ સાથે લડાઈ કરી રહ્યો છું. "

ખૂબ સરળ રીતે, તે પોતાને 'એક ફિલીસ્ટીન' કહે છે બ્રિટન આવ્યા ત્યારથી તે ઘણું બદલાઈ ગયું છે, પરંતુ તે બ્રિટિશ વલણને મોટાભાગના સમાન ગણે છે. "બ્રિટનમાં, તેણી કહે છે," બ્રિટીશ કોણ છે અને કોણ નથી તે જાણવું અગત્યનું છે. આ સૂક્ષ્મતા હંમેશા ત્યાં છે. "

યાસ્મીન 10 થી વધુ વર્ષોથી શિક્ષક તરીકે કામ કરે છે. પછી તે શરણાર્થીઓ સાથે કામ કરવા માટે આગળ વધ્યો, તેમને ભાષા અને અસ્તિત્વ ટકાવી રાખવાની કુશળતા શીખવી. તેણી કબૂલે છે કે તે હંમેશાં વિખેરાઈ જવા માટે મજબૂત ઉત્કટ હતું. 35 વર્ષની ઉંમરે, તેમણે પત્રકાર તરીકેની કારકીર્દિની શરૂઆત કરી હતી અને છેલ્લાં 22 વર્ષથી તે મજબૂત બની રહી છે. તેમણે ધ ગાર્ડિયન, ન્યૂ સ્ટેટસમેન, ધ ન્યૂ યોર્ક ટાઇમ્સ, અને ન્યૂઝવીક માટે લખ્યું છે. તેમણે અસંખ્ય રેડિયો અને ટેલિવિઝન કાર્યક્રમો પર કામ કર્યું છે, જે ચેનલ 4 અને બીબીસી માટે ડોક્યુમેંટરીઓનું નિર્માણ કરે છે.

1995 માં, તેમની વ્યાપક રીતે વખાણાયેલી આત્મચરિત્ર નો પ્લેસ લાઇક હોમ, યુગાન્ડામાં તેમના પ્રારંભિક જીવનની વિભાજન દર્શાવે છે. તેમણે સંમત છે કે દક્ષિણ આફ્રિકામાં વિપરીત, જ્યાં લોકો રંગભેદ સાથે મળીને કામ કરતા હતા, "પૂર્વ આફ્રિકામાં, અમારી પાસે વિભાજીત વ્યક્તિત્વ હતું". એક તરફ, "અમે ગાંધી અને નેહરુને પ્રેમ કરતા હતા અને સુખી હતા કે ભારત સ્વતંત્ર છે પણ યુગાન્ડા સ્વતંત્ર થયા ત્યારે પણ અમે બુમરાણ" તેણીએ તેના પ્રકારની 'બદલે schizoid' કહે છે

1999 માં, યાસ્મીને સાચું કલર્સ પ્રકાશિત કર્યા હતા, જેમાં રાજકીય નેતૃત્વ અને વંશીય લઘુમતીઓ પ્રત્યેનો તેમનો અભિગમ હતો. તે બ્રિટિશ સરકારને જાતિવાદ સામે લડવાની દિશા તરફ આગળ વધવા માટે કહે છે. પીએમઓએ તેમને કહ્યું હતું કે વડા પ્રધાન પોતાની પુસ્તક પ્રસ્તુત કરવા ઈચ્છે છે, તેથી તે પીએમઓ તરફથી મળવા માટે આશ્ચર્ય પામી હતી, અને તેથી તે તે હતી.

તેના કેટલાક કાર્યોમાં અમે શું વિચારો છો, તે છે: નવી બ્રિટનની કલ્પના, બહુસાંસ્કૃતિકવાદ પછી, લવનો રંગ: મિશ્ર રેસ સંબંધો, મિશ્ર લાગણીઓ અને મારા કેટલાક શ્રેષ્ઠ મિત્રો છે. તેણીએ બીબીસી એએસઆઈએ એવોર્ડ ફોર એચીવમેન્ટ ઈન રાઇટિંગ 1999, કમિશન ફોર રેસીયલ ઇક્વાલિટી સ્પેશિયલ એવોર્ડ ફોર રીસિયલ ઇક્વાલીટી સ્પેશિયલ એવોર્ડ, જર્નાલિઝમ 2000, ઇએમએમએ મીડિયા પર્સનાલિટી ઓફ ધ યર 2000 અને જ્યોર્જ ઓરવેલ પ્રાઇઝ ફોર પોલિટિકલ જર્નાલિઝમ 2002 સહિત અનેક પ્રતિષ્ઠિત પુરસ્કારો જીત્યા છે.

ભારતમાં, તે જોવા માટે ઉદાસ છે કે બ્રિટનની જેમ, અહીં પણ સમૃદ્ધ લોકો માટે લોકોમાં માનની ભાવના છે. પરંતુ સ્કૂલના વિદ્યાર્થીઓ અહીં જોઈને તેના હૃદયની ખુશીથી કૂદી જાય છે કારણ કે તેણી કહે છે કે તેઓ જાણે છે કે કેવી રીતે વર્તે છે. બ્રિટનમાં, તેઓ વર્તે છે, ડ્રેસ અને ખૂબ જ કઠોરતાથી વાત કરે છે. યાસ્મીનનું માનવું છે કે જો તેણી ભારતમાં અભ્યાસ કરશે તો તેની 13 વર્ષની દીકરીને ઘણો ફાયદો થશે.

તે હાલમાં મલાબાર દરિયાકિનારાની શરૂઆતથી એક ઐતિહાસિક ખોરાક યાદો પર કામ કરી રહી છે. તે 60 એડીથી ખોરાકની સફર મારફતે છે, જે યાસ્મીન ગુજરાત અને કચ્છના લોકોના સ્થળાંતર પર જોશે જે આફ્રિકા અને બાકીના વિશ્વ માટે ઇન્ડન્ટચર્ડ મજૂરો તરીકે લેવામાં આવ્યા હતા. - TWF