Melissa Williams

Research

Title of Research:

We are Here to Stay Inna Inglan: Britain’s Immigration Regime, Contingent Status and Belonging Amongst Windrush Descendants of Jamaican Heritage

Brief overview of research topic:

My research examines the role of the British immigration regime in shaping the legal status of ‘Windrush Descendants’ of Jamaican heritage and the extent to which state interventions may influence their subjective sense of belonging. More specifically, I consider the extent to which Descendant’s legal status has been rendered as ‘contingent’ through macro-structures such as immigration legislation, supplementary changes to immigration rules, enforcement practices and geopolitical relations between the Jamaican and British governments. The research also seeks to understand the ways in which a subjective sense of belonging has emerged in this context and explores how Descendants articulate their sense of belonging and resist hegemonic narratives of exclusion and inclusion through transnational practices and community resistance.

Qualifications

Qualifications:

• Social Research (MA), University of York (2022)
• Applied Human Rights, University of York (MA) (2020)
• Law (LLB), University of York (2019)

Presentations

Presentations

• 2023- Panellist- Windrush Voices: Building an Oral History. (Voices of Windrush Festival).
• 2023- Presentation- The Windrush Scandal, Descendants and ‘Un-Belonging’ In Britain (Black History Conversations).
• 2022- Presentation - The Role of Post-2012 Immigration Legislation in the ‘Un-Homing’ of Windrush Descendants in Britain (Windrush Parliamentary Lobbying Event).
• 2022- Panellist- Windrush Lessons not Learned: The Ongoing Impact Hostile Environment for Racially Minoritised People in Britain. (Leigh Day, Lessons not Learned Event).
• 2022- Panellist- In Conversation with Joseph Gascoigne, Possibilities of Hope: Politics, Citizenship and Social Change. (York Hope Symposium Seminar Series).
• 2021- Panellist - ‘Uplift’- Righting the wrongs of the Hostile Environment for the Windrush Generation. (Uplift Public Viewing).
• 2021- Panellist - Horizons of Hope. (York Festival of Ideas).

Conferences

Conference Presentations

• Williams, M. (2023). The Coloniality of Belonging: To what extent has post-2000 British immigration legislation developed to conditionalise the belonging of Descendants of the Windrush Generation? (University of the West Indies and University of Leicester Summer School).
• Parker, S. Williams, M. (2022) The Politics of Hope: Perspectives from London. (Political Studies Association)
• Williams, M. (2022). Un-homed: How has the Hostile Environment Immigration Policy Worked to Marginalise British-Born Windrush Descendants? (Political Studies Association).

Teaching experience

Teaching experience

• GTA - Semester 1 (2023) Global Challenges, Department of Politics and International Relations
• Co-lead- Liverpool Field trip(2023) Interdisciplinary Global Development Centre