ABSTRACT
Between 1955 and 1971, some 27,000 Barbadians migrated to Britain. It was a migration whose dimensions paralleled that to Panama at the turn of the century. Each of those migratory movements occurred within a particular pocket of time, or historical duration, closely related to the past, but distinguished from it. Nevertheless, adapting Raymond Williams notion of a 'structure of feeling' may offer some insights, for it highlights the historical dimension of culture and period in ways which sociological or anthropological models of cultural dissonance and adaptation, or economic models of rationalitity and calculus, do not. In particular, the notion recognises any one 'period' contains three or more generations, who bring with them both a past and a future, tensions which drive and explain change, and give it contemporary meaning and which do. The tradition of migration, and its particular characteristic of migrations by individuals on a temporary basis led also to particular patterns of settlement.
