Between generations: the construction of mother-daughter relationships in the work of black women playwrights in Britain

Since the end of the Second World War, race relations and immigration have become major subjects of debate in the political, social and cultural life of Britain. The presence of immigrants from Britain's former colonies and the subsequent arrival of economic migrants and asylum seekers have triggered discussion of many issues, not least those surrounding difference, assimilation, diversity and identity (Gilroy 1993). It is these particular issues (and the tensions that they engender), often articulated through the depiction of mother-daughter relationships, which are dramatized in the work of contemporary Black British female playwrights such as Winsome Pinnock, Trish Cooke, Paulette Randall, Maya Chowdry, J. B. Rose, Tanika Gupta, Rukhsana Ahmad, Jackie Kay, Grace Dayley, Jacqueline Rudet, Maria Oshodi and Zindika2. My thesis is thus about the construction of mother-daughter relationships as presented in the work of these playwrights. It places particular emphasis on how mothers and daughters negotiate their relationships, positions and identities in the context of their respective experiences as first- and second- generation female migrants in Britain