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What do you think the title Small Island refers to?
  • Key Stage 3
  • Year 9
  • English
Yeah, so I think (children play) Andrea would agree that "Small Island" is, it's one of those brilliant titles that works on different levels. There's the "Small Island," which is Jamaica, which is literally in the great scheme of things, a small island. There's the small island that is Great Britain or the UK, which again is, in context, it probably is geographically a small island, but I think it also is about the mentality. It's a reference to the mentality of the people who live on islands, but I think it's definitely a reference to the thing of living on an island and, (children playing continues) in the case of Great Britain, sort of cutting yourself off, feeling that you have control over this space, which has sea all around it, and is therefore somehow kind of impenetrable. A sense of inseeliness, not looking outwards, not being part, so for example, if you live in Italy or Germany, you're in the heart of Europe. You have borders with various different countries and there's a kind of sense of fluidity of people and ideas over these borders. Whereas in Great Britain, certainly at that time, (children playing continues) before, yeah, up until the first waves of immigration, post-Second World War, (children playing continues) there was this sense of inseeliness of somehow thinking we were right, and better, and sure of ourselves and being very, very wary, and hostile to a large extent, to outsiders. I think now it's interesting that you hear people say all the time, which I think also picks up on what Andrea was talking about, this thing of "We're only small and we're full. There's too many people. We're Full. We're small." And there's a sort of. Yeah, I think that feeds into it as well. And then again with Jamaica at the time, that sense of that they did feel as though they were just a little island, a small island which was part of this thing called Empire, which was this wonderful, great big thing that was over there somewhere, and that the motherland was Britain and London and that they're just, somehow, this little tiny dot, this satellite on the outer edges of what's really important. (children playing continues) And obviously, that was being challenged, which is great, by the fact that there was an independence movement in Jamaica at the time, and there was definitely some people who didn't see themselves in that role, but for a lot of Jamaicans, simply because that's what had been imposed on them and that's what the education system had reinforced, that is how they saw themselves, to an extent. So, yes, I think it's all those things in play.
What do you think the title Small Island refers to?
  • Key Stage 3
  • Year 9
  • English
Yeah, so I think (children play) Andrea would agree that "Small Island" is, it's one of those brilliant titles that works on different levels. There's the "Small Island," which is Jamaica, which is literally in the great scheme of things, a small island. There's the small island that is Great Britain or the UK, which again is, in context, it probably is geographically a small island, but I think it also is about the mentality. It's a reference to the mentality of the people who live on islands, but I think it's definitely a reference to the thing of living on an island and, (children playing continues) in the case of Great Britain, sort of cutting yourself off, feeling that you have control over this space, which has sea all around it, and is therefore somehow kind of impenetrable. A sense of inseeliness, not looking outwards, not being part, so for example, if you live in Italy or Germany, you're in the heart of Europe. You have borders with various different countries and there's a kind of sense of fluidity of people and ideas over these borders. Whereas in Great Britain, certainly at that time, (children playing continues) before, yeah, up until the first waves of immigration, post-Second World War, (children playing continues) there was this sense of inseeliness of somehow thinking we were right, and better, and sure of ourselves and being very, very wary, and hostile to a large extent, to outsiders. I think now it's interesting that you hear people say all the time, which I think also picks up on what Andrea was talking about, this thing of "We're only small and we're full. There's too many people. We're Full. We're small." And there's a sort of. Yeah, I think that feeds into it as well. And then again with Jamaica at the time, that sense of that they did feel as though they were just a little island, a small island which was part of this thing called Empire, which was this wonderful, great big thing that was over there somewhere, and that the motherland was Britain and London and that they're just, somehow, this little tiny dot, this satellite on the outer edges of what's really important. (children playing continues) And obviously, that was being challenged, which is great, by the fact that there was an independence movement in Jamaica at the time, and there was definitely some people who didn't see themselves in that role, but for a lot of Jamaicans, simply because that's what had been imposed on them and that's what the education system had reinforced, that is how they saw themselves, to an extent. So, yes, I think it's all those things in play.