ABSTRACT
By the 1970s, professional wrestling was a staple of live entertainment in the UK. Regular events took place up and down the country, drawing audiences to venues in small towns and major cities. At the same time, wrestling was a weekly fixture on television, broadcast into homes throughout the nation. Even as it enjoyed great popularity, wrestling’s colourful spectacle, like much of British pop culture at the time, found itself at the conflux of an insular nationalism and multiculturalism that was redefining British society. The seventies and eighties marked a period during which Britain’s ongoing, post-World War II racial diversification came to the forefront of public life more than ever before. Wary of this, the country’s political powers sought to promote a national identity that effectively marginalised non-white immigrants from former British colonies in the Caribbean, Africa, and Asia. This phenomenon, which intensified with the Conservative politician Margaret Thatcher’s ascent to power during the latter half of the seventies and dominance of the entire eighties, was defined by scholar Martin Barker in 1981 as the “new racism.”1 The new racism was striking in that it acknowledged the visible racial diversity of Britain in the seventies and eighties even as it sought to consign immigrants to the periphery. Its implications extended beyond politics to the cultural sphere, where nonwhite performers in television, film, and theatre struggled for recognition.2 The inadequate representation and persistent stereotyping of non-whites in British entertainment were topics of debate and the sources of controversy for critics and groups, such as the Campaign against Racism in the Media, who perceived covert racism as endemic within the television industry.3 As a popular medium, it was inevitable that wrestling would play host to characters who reflected both progressive and regressive attitudes towards Britain’s changing demographics.
