Routes to Roots: Exploring Croydon’s South Asian heritage

An enthralling adventure into the multicultural heritage of Croydon is showing for another two weeks.

Routes to Roots – A South Asian Heritage Project Exhibition – opened at the Museum of Croydon in Katharine Street, Croydon, last month and will run until April 26.

A multimedia exhibition, Routes to Roots includes artwork, poetry, documentaries, podcasts and interactive installations which challenge the assumptions and stereotypes of South Asian communities.

The exhibition is part of a wider programme of the same name bringing together heritage, community and arts partners from South Asian populations in Bradford, Sheffield and Croydon. 

Across the last three years, these communities have been working together to explore and document their experiences with migration, family, home, and cultural identity.

Stories will be told from various countries such as India, Guyana, Malawi, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Kenya. 

South Asia is the southern region of Asia, which consists of the countries of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. Each of these countries have been impacted by its relationship with Britain, primarily through war, colonisation, and the British Empire. 

There are significant South Asian diaspora communities in many parts of the UK. Despite their contributions to these communities, from food to music, fashion and language, the history of South Asian populations in the UK is largely untold.

Routes to Roots hopes to reclaim this history by giving a voice to the communities and creating a digital legacy – film, audio, photographic – for the next generation.

Members of the Anglo-Indian and South Asian communities in Croydon were interviewed as part of our project. These oral histories have been transformed into podcasts and will be kept in archives in the borough.

In association with Stanley Arts, led by Janet Steel, and Rez Kabir, with filming by Natalie Sloan, members of the South Asian and Anglo-Indian community in Croydon have also created a short documentary, Routes to Roots: 1960s Croydon.

Members of Croydon’s Anglo-Indian and South Asian Community aged between 60 and 87-years-old worked to create the documentary by performing and recording stories, memories and monologues, more than 60 years after they moved to the borough.

The project has also involved a series of creative arts workshops in Bradford and Sheffield, through which participants explored their heritage. 

The workshops will culminate in a presentation at Migration Matters Festival between June 14 and 22 in Sheffield, where all three groups will come together to perform their work. 

The project has been coordinated by Maya Productions, a theatre company focused on making work led by South Asian, African, Latin American Diaspora and other Global Majority Background artists and involving underrepresented communities across the arts.

Suzanne Gorman, artistic director of Maya Productions said: “The experiences of the Anglo-Indian community are rarely seen on stage, screen or in museums.

“Bringing these voices together in a full-scale exhibition is a first for Maya Productions. I look forward to more people engaging with these stories, lives and the creativity of the individuals and communities we have been working with.”

For more information and opening times visit https://mayaproductions.co.uk/routes-to-roots-exhibition/

Pictured top: Routes to Roots Exhibition in Croydon Museum (Picture: Christoper Bovell)