The sound of belonging: Exclusion through language

Calls for migrants to learn English, supposedly for the purpose of ‘integration’, have formed a large part of immigration discourse in recent years. In 2022, Transport for London unveiled a new sign at Whitechapel tube station, written in Bengali. The initiative was intended to commemorate the contribution made to the London Borough of Tower Hamlets by the Bengali community, which comprises 35% of the borough’s population. However, just last year, MP for Great Yarmouth and leader of Restore Britain, Rupert Lowe, condemned the sign, writing that it “should be in English, and English only”, which in turn received a succinct “yes” in reply from Elon Musk.

The sentiment of Lowe and others demonstrates the fact that the English language is itself political. As a consequence of Britain’s imperial, mercantile, and often violent contact with communities across the globe, English has forcibly become the lingua franca of the modern world. The results of this, I believe, are twofold: large parts of the world do speak English, having either been colonised by the British or extensively traded with. But, some level of spoken or written English is now seen as a certain bet in all corners of the world, where it perhaps should not be. The expectation of migrants to learn English, while having no time or space made for their native languages, is a form of insidious hypocrisy. In turn, the expectation that English should be accommodated abroad is reflective of the entitlement that comes with being the historic beneficiaries of empire.

The reactionary outrage at Whitechapel station was perhaps outdone earlier this year by the controversy surrounding the Green Party’s decision to publish campaign materials in six different languages. The Oxford branch of the party posted their own promise of accessible communication to their Instagram in April, with the message translated into Arabic, Portuguese, Mandarin, and Polish. Yet, similar efforts in Leeds and Manchester were met with staunch criticism from the right. In the context of the high-profile by-election in Gorton and Denton earlier this year, GB News’ reporting describes the move as prompting “accusations of sectarianism”, and Ed West of The Spectator writes of the Green Party as “Britain’s sectional Islamist party” – essentially accusing the Green Party of privileging Muslims at the expense of an undisclosed and indeterminate group. Outrage in the media bleeds into legislation: Conservative MP for Hamble Valley Paul Holmes’ proposed amendment to the Representation of the People Bill, which would have banned the publication of campaign materials in foreign languages, was proposed and rejected in parliament on 16th April 2026.

Is this practice really ‘sectarian’? Or, is it a show of inclusivity to non-native English speakers, in an increasingly hostile political environment? Those who may not have British or Commonwealth citizenship, and therefore cannot vote, also still deserve to know what is going on in their area. Political language can often be full of jargon and unintelligible for even a decent speaker of English, and keeping all residents informed equally may only improve social cohesion. Fundamentally, the Green Party is much more welcoming of migration than any other major British party, and its campaign certainly reflects this.

As a city, Oxford is relatively progressive when it comes to accommodating migrants with little English – it has been a City of Sanctuary since 2025, meaning that it prides itself on the dignity and welfare it affords those seeking sanctuary, working with schools, local charities like Asylum Welcome, and further education colleges to provide low-cost or free ESOL lessons. Oxford is also twinned with seven cities, spanning from Italy to Palestine, and international students make up 43% of the University’s student body, contributing to a general atmosphere of open-mindedness amongst the numerous cultural societies offered. But while Oxford may be leading the pack in this sense, and may also benefit from the impassioned swathes of student activists, progress is not always linear – there have already been two protests this term by Oxfordshire Patriots, whose organiser reported to Cherwell that he doesn’t “believe Nazis seem very good, however, some of our views are the same…I don’t agree with everything they say”. In this month’s local elections, the head of the University’s Staff Immigration Team, responsible for providing “free and impartial advice on immigration matters to current and prospective University employees, visitors and their accompanying dependants”, ran unsuccessfully in Oxford’s Littlemore ward as a Reform UK candidate, representing a party that wishes to abolish Indefinite Leave to Remain and withdraw from the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).

The simple fact is that life is far more difficult when you do not speak the dominant language. Anecdotally, it can be anxiety-inducing to go to a foreign country and not know how to buy a bus ticket, ask for medicine, or order food. What’s more, learning a language is also a hugely difficult task, the obligation of which does not seem to apply to British people in this discourse: Britain is the least likely European country to speak a second language. And the very lack of obligation to do so harms sole-English speakers too – this also being a significant factor in the poor language teaching standards at British schools. Only 2.97% of 2024 A-Level entries were for a classical or modern foreign language. As a result, Britain ranks far behind other European countries in bilingualism (50% overall vs 30% UK).

It would be a lie to claim that speaking English presents an equal playing field, as Britain’s own problems with accent discrimination have been well-documented. Crucially, most migrants do speak at least a decent level of English: the University of Oxford’s Migration Observatory found that 90% of migrants residing in the UK self-reported as speaking a good level of English in the 2021 census, and that use of English only increases with time. Several studies have shown that migration patterns tend to align with historic ties to colonial powers – for example, a French speaker from Senegal may be more likely to emigrate to France – due to linguistic and cultural ties to the imperial centre (however, this may not always outweigh the economic factors which contribute to migration). While sensationalised reports may speak of one million migrants being unable to speak English, they neglect the nine million migrants who can speak English.

Ultimately, I think that history matters, and that the British government has a particular responsibility to accommodate all migrants actively welcomed into the country. From Windrush onwards, migrants were regularly employed in Oxford’s car manufacturing industry, an economic powerhouse with a rich history. Is it right to exclude from society those who do not have a perfect grasp of English, using the language as a barometer of how much one might ‘deserve’ a normal life in Britain, when the simple fact of the matter is that Britain’s colonial past has diversified the country? Should we force those with poorer levels of English to suffer the barriers to a good quality of life that English-only signage can pose? Why do we shudder at the thought of this, while expecting English to take us so far while abroad?