‘No Place Like Home: Windrush and Legacies of 20th Century Migration in the UK and Beyond’
A student-led exhibition from the Centre for British Studies with a contribution from King’s College London

Senatssaal, Unter den Linden 6, 10117 Berlin
Saturday June 28, 2025. 5pm till midnight

The MA students (2024-26) of Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin’s Centre for British Studies warmly welcome you to “No Place Like Home: Windrush and Legacies of 20th Century Migration in the UK and Beyond”—an exhibition in Humboldt’s Senatssaal dedicated to the thousands of Commonwealth citizens who arrived in Britain between 1948 and 1971 and their descendants. Taking up essential roles in transport, healthcare, construction, and other public services, these migrants played a crucial role in the nation’s postwar recovery. Despite their significant contributions, they faced systemic racism in their new home. In the face of extreme adversity, the Windrush Generation, and its descendants, transformed the UK’s cultural, social, and political fabric through politics, food, music, literature, film, business, fashion, pedagogy, and art. This research-based and interactive exhibit honours their legacy. A second part of the exhibit, conceived by students from King’s College London’s Department of European and International Studies, considers another parallel history of migration, that of West Germany’s so-called Gastarbeiter or guest workers, who arrived between 1955 - 1971.

Public events accompany the exhibit. Talks include Tanja-Bianca Schmidt’s (TU Dresden) discussion of images of border violence in “How Can Violence be Appropriately Addressed? Some Thoughts on Images and Their Ethical Dilemma” at 6pm and Dr. Patrick Helber’s (Ethnologisches Museum, Berlin) “Dancehall and Homophobia” at 7pm. We are thrilled to announce publishing consultant and cultural strategist Sharmaine Lovegrove, Publisher at Large of Hachette UK’s Dialogue Books and Windrush generation descendant, as our keynote speaker, with a talk entitled “Windrush to Weltstadt: A Londoner’s Journey through Legacy and Language” at 8pm. Start the evening with our Notting Hill carnival inspired mask-making workshop from 5pm till 6pm. Our letter writing station, and our children’s table, Kid’s Rush, make this a family friendly event. Guided tours of the exhibition in English, German and Turkish are scheduled at 9pm, 10pm, and 11pm respectively.

In honour of its 25th anniversary, this year’s Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften tickets are only €5. Children under 6 are free. For more on ticketing and for additional information, please see: https://www.langenachtderwissenschaften.de/.