The Windrush and the BUMIDOM: The memorialization of Caribbean migration

Abstract

This article examines the role of the ‘Windrush’, a term which stands for post-war Caribbean migration to Britain, in cultural and political memory, and compares it to a similar migratory phenomenon which occurred in the French context. In 1963, the BUMIDOM (Bureau pour le développement des migrations dans les départements d’outre-mer/Bureau for the Development of Migration in the Overseas Departments) was formally established, thus initiating mass migration to metropolitan France. The BUMIDOM acted as a labour recruitment agency, financing the transportation, recruitment and housing of workers from France’s former Caribbean colonies. The article argues that the BUMIDOM has not been commemorated by museums, institutions or memorials because this would mean contesting France’s Republican model of universalism which does not recognize identitarian categories such as race. In contrast, British institutions have incorporated the ‘Windrush’ story into the national narrative, but Caribbean communities prefer to memorialize Caribbean migration on their own terms.