The education, employment and integration of Indian and Pakistani youths in Newcastle upon Tyne :an empirical study

Abstract

This is a study of Indian and Pakistani youths growing up in one northern English city* I examine in turn their educational performance, their employment, their attitude towards religion, their friendships and their relations with their parents, particularly over the, question of marriage. I discuss how they saw themselves and how they saw their future. Finally, I try to define the emerging style of integration. As the basis of the study I sought to interview all the Indian and Pakistani boys who reached leaving age in the city's schools over the six years 1962-67. I succeeded in interviewing 67 of them, aged between 15 and 21. I originally intended to include Indian and Pakistani girls in my research but I gave up after a series of encounters with glowering fathers who would not let me past the front door. I give the city its proper name of Newcastle upon Tyne. Partly this is because I dislike blank topographical pseudonyms like "North City". Partly it is because this is a study in depth in which I seek to embed the young Indians and Pakistanis firmly and, I hope, vividly in the context of locality and region. Newcastle in its population of 249,240 had, according to the 1966 Sample Census, 150 persons born in the West Indies, 390 born in Pakistan and 1,200 born in India. This - undoubtedly an underestimate - represents a proportion of O.7 per cent. The Proportion throughout the Tyneside conurbation was 0.3 per cent. It may be argued that because of these small Percentages Newcastle is untypical of areas in which Indians and Pakistanis have settled, It may be so but I it must first be established. This is an unashamedly local study of Indian and Pakistani youths in Newcastle, but I use for comparison all available data from other parts of the country, such as it is. In reaching my'conculusions I take account of such differential factors as density of settlement, industrial structure and sohool-leaving patterns. I believe it is only by being painstakingly local that one can distinguish between general and specific considerations.