Iranians in the United Kingdom

Iranian citizens and nationals of the United Kingdom

Ethnic group

British-Iranians
ایرانیان بریتانیا

Total population
Iranian-born residents in the United Kingdom: 114,432
(2021/22 census)[note 1]
England: 106,801 (2021)[1]
Scotland: 4,803 (2022)[2]
Wales: 2,367 (2021)[1]
Northern Ireland: 461 (2021)[3]
Previous estimates:
42,494 (2001 census)
84,735 (2011 census)
70,000 (2017 ONS estimate)
Regions with significant populations
London,[4] Manchester, Liverpool
Languages
British English, Persian, Azerbaijani, Armenian, Kurdish and other languages of Iran. (see Languages of Iran)
Religion
Shia Islam, Non-religion, Christianity, Judaism, Baháʼí, Sunni Islam, Zoroastrianism, Other.

1. ^ Does not include ethnic Iranians born in the United Kingdom or those with Iranian ancestry

Related ethnic groups
Iranian diaspora (Iranians of UAE • Ajam of Bahrain • Ajam of Qatar • Ajam of Iraq • 'Ajam of Kuwait • Iranians of Canada • Iranians of America • Iranians of UK • Iranians of Germany • Iranians of Israel • Iranians in Turkey)

Iranian peoples (Lurs, Achomis, Baluchs, Kurds, Iranian Azeris), Turkic peoples (Qashqai, Azerbaijanis), Huwala
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Iranians in the United Kingdom consist of people of Iranian nationality who have settled in the United Kingdom, as well as British residents and citizens of Iranian heritage. Iranians in the United Kingdom are referred to by hyphenated terms such as British-Iranians, British-Persians, Iranian-Britons, or Persian-Britons.[5]

As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the British-Iranian population was approximately 114,432 people. The vast majority of British-Iranians arrived after the Islamic Revolution of 1979, with an estimated 8,000 Iranian asylum seekers arriving in the United Kingdom in the following five years. Due to intensifying religious and political persecution, particularly of Iranian Christians, the numbers of Iranian asylum seekers arriving at UK soil has significantly risen in recent years.[vague][6][7]

## Terminology

[edit]

British-Iranian is used interchangeably with British-Persian,[8][9][10][11] partly due to the fact[12] that, in the Western world, Iran was known as "Persia". On the Nowruz of 1935, Reza Shah Pahlavi asked foreign delegates to use the term Iran, the endonym of the country used since the Sasanian Empire, in formal correspondence. Since then the use of the word "Iran" has become more common in the Western countries. This also changed the usage of the terms for Iranian nationality, and the common adjective for citizens of Iran changed from "Persian" to "Iranian". In 1959, the government of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Reza Shah's son, announced that both "Persia" and "Iran" could officially be used interchangeably.[13] However the issue is still debated today.[14][15]

There is a tendency among British-Iranians to categorize themselves as "Persian" rather than "Iranian", mainly to dissociate themselves from the Islamic regime of Iran which has been in power since the 1979 revolution and the negativity associated with it, and also to distinguish themselves as being of Persian ethnicity, which comprise about 65% of Iran's population.[8][16] While the majority of British-Iranians come from Persian backgrounds, there is a significant number of non-Persian Iranians such as Azerbaijanis[17][18][19] and Kurds within the British-Iranian community,[16][20] leading some scholars to believe that the label "Iranian" is more inclusive, since the label "Persian" excludes non-Persian minorities.[16] The Collins English Dictionary uses a variety of similar and overlapping definitions for the terms "Persian" and "Iranian".[21][22]

## History

[edit]

The vast majority of Iranians in the UK arrived after the Iranian Revolution of 1979. In the following five years, an estimated 8,000 Iranian asylum seekers arrived in the country. The 1981 census showed 28,617 persons born in Iran (18,132 men, 10,485 women). Iranians were not separately distinguished in the 1991 census.[23] The 2001 census recorded 42,494 persons born in Iran.[24] In the 2011 census, 79,985 Iranian-born people were recorded in England, 1,695 in Wales,[25] 2,773 in Scotland[26] and 282 in Northern Ireland.[27] The Office for National Statistics estimates that, in 2017, 70,000 Iranian-born people were living in the UK.[28] In 2004, the Iranian embassy in London estimated that as many as 75,000 Iranians might reside in the country.[23] Most adults are themselves immigrants; the second generation are quite young, and so there are relatively few adults of Iranian background born and raised in the UK.[29]

In the six-year period between 2018 and 2023, 21,565 Iranian nationals entered the United Kingdom by crossing the English Channel using small boats – the most common nationality of all small boat arrivals.[30][31]

## Religion

[edit]

Iran is a primarily Shia Muslim country with Jewish, Baháʼí, Christian and Zoroastrian communities, a fact reflected in the migrant population in the UK.[32][33] However, there is an increasing number of Iranian atheists and agnostics. Some Iranians in the UK have converted from Shi'ism to various sects of Christianity.[34] There are also active Jewish and Christian communities among British Iranians.[35][36]

## See also

[edit]

* List of British Iranians
* Iranian diaspora
* Iran–United Kingdom relations

## References

[edit]

### Notes

[edit]

1. ^ a b "Country of birth (extended)". Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 28 March 2023.
2. ^ "Table UV204 - Country of birth: Country by Country of Birth by Individuals". National Records of Scotland. Retrieved 24 May 2024. '2022' > 'All of Scotland' > 'Ethnic group, national identity, language and religion' > 'Country of birth: UV204'
3. ^ "MS-A18: Country of birth - full detail". Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency. 22 September 2022. Retrieved 25 May 2023.
4. ^ "Born abroad: Iran", BBC News, 7 September 2005, retrieved 29 June 2019
5. ^ Harbottle 2004
6. ^ Rouch, Abigail Frymann (2024-02-23). "Christian converts under pressure to leave Iran". Church Times. Retrieved 2024-09-20.
7. ^ Bandow, Doug (2024-05-11). "Iran Tries to Stem Religious Conversions from Islam". Cato Institute. Retrieved 2024-09-20.
8. ^ a b Daha, Maryam (September 2011). "Contextual Factors Contributing to Ethnic Identity Development of Second-Generation Iranian American Adolescents". Journal of Adolescent Research. 26 (5): 543–569. doi:10.1177/0743558411402335. S2CID 146592244. "... the majority of the participants self-identified themselves as Persian instead of Iranian, due to the stereotypes and negative portrayals of Iranians in the media and politics. Adolescents from Jewish and Baháʼí faiths asserted their religious identity more than their ethnic identity. The fact Iranians use Persian interchangeably is nothing to do with current Iranian government because the name Iran was used before this period as well. Linguistically modern Persian is a branch of Old Persian in the family of Indo-European languages and that includes all the minorities as well more inclusively."
9. ^ Nakamura, Raymond M. (2003). Health in America: A Multicultural Perspective. Kendall/Hunt Pub. p. 31\. ISBN 978-0-7575-0637-6. "Iranian/Persian Americans – The flow of Iranian citizens into the United States began in 1979, during and after the Islamic Revolution."
10. ^ Zanger, Mark (2001). The American Ethnic Cookbook for Students. ABC-CLIO. p. 213\. ISBN 978-1-57356-345-1. Retrieved December 21, 2016.
11. ^ Racial and Ethnic Relations in America, Carl Leon Bankston,"Therefore, Turkish and Iranian (Persian) Americans, who are Muslims but not ethnically Arabs, are often mistakenly..", Salem Press, 2000
12. ^ Darya, Fereshteh Haeri (2007). ISBN 978-0-542-97374-1. Retrieved 21 December 2016. "According to previous studies, the presence of heterogeneity is evident among Iranian immigrants (also known as Persians – Iran was known as Persia until 1935) who came from myriads of religious (Muslim, Christian, Jewish, Armenian, Assyrian, Baháʼí and Zoroastrian), ethnic (Turk, Kurds, Baluchs, Lurs, Turkamans, Arabs, as well as tribes such as Ghasghaie, and Bakhtiari), linguistic/dialogic background (Persian, Azari, Gialki, Mazandarani, Kurdish, Arabic, and others). Cultural, religious and political, and various other differences among Iranians reflect their diverse social and interpersonal interactions. Some studies suggest that, despite the existence of subgroup within Iranian immigrants (e.g. various ethno-religious groups), their nationality as Iranians has been an important point of reference and identifiable source of their identification as a group across time and setting."
13. ^ Yarshater, Ehsan Persia or Iran, Persian or Farsi Archived 2010-10-24 at the Wayback Machine, Iranian Studies, vol. XXII no. 1 (1989)
14. ^ Majd, Hooman, The Ayatollah Begs to Differ: The Paradox of Modern Iran, by Hooman Majd, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, September 23, 2008, ISBN 0385528426, 9780385528429. p. 161
15. ^ Frye, Richard Nelson (2005). Greater Iran: A 20th-century Odyssey. Mazda. ISBN 9781568591773. Retrieved December 21, 2016.
16. ^ a b c Bozorgmehr, Mehdi (2009). "Iran". In Mary C. Waters; Reed Ueda; Helen B. Marrow (eds.). The New Americans: A Guide to Immigration since 1965. Harvard University Press. p. 469\. ISBN 978-0-674-04493-7.
17. ^ Svante E. Cornell (20 May 2015). Azerbaijan Since Independence. Routledge. p. 7\. ISBN 978-1-317-47621-4.
18. ^ Barbara A. West (1 January 2009). Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Asia and Oceania. Infobase Publishing. p. 68\. ISBN 978-1-4381-1913-7.
19. ^ James Minahan (1 January 2002). Encyclopedia of the Stateless Nations: S-Z. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 1766\. ISBN 978-0-313-32384-3.
20. ^ Elizabeth Chacko, Contemporary ethnic geographies in America // Ines M. Miyares, Christopher A. Airriess (eds.), Rowman & Littlefield, 2007, pp. 325–326
21. ^ "Collins English Dictionary – Complete & Unabridged 11th Edition". Collinsdictionary.com. Retrieved September 4, 2012.
22. ^ "Definition of "Persian"". Collins English Dictionary. Retrieved January 12, 2016.
23. ^ a b Spellman 2004, p. 38
24. ^ Country-of-birth database, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, archived from the original on 2005-05-11, retrieved 2009-01-25
25. ^ "2011 Census: Country of birth (expanded), regions in England and Wales". Office for National Statistics. 26 March 2013. Retrieved 24 June 2018.
26. ^ "Country of birth (detailed)" (PDF). National Records of Scotland. Retrieved 24 June 2018.
27. ^ "Country of Birth – Full Detail: QS206NI". Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency. Retrieved 24 June 2018.
28. ^ "Table 1.3: Overseas-born population in the United Kingdom, excluding some residents in communal establishments, by sex, by country of birth, January 2017 to December 2017". Office for National Statistics. 24 May 2018. Retrieved 24 June 2018. Figure given is the central estimate. See the source for 95% confidence intervals.
29. ^ Harbottle 2004, p. 145
30. ^ "Official Statistics: Irregular migration to the UK, year ending December 2022". gov.uk. Home Office. Retrieved 23 February 2023.
31. ^ "Statistics relating to the Illegal Migration Act: data tables to December 2023". gov.uk. Home Office. Retrieved 2 January 2024.
32. ^ Spellman 2004, p. 59
33. ^ Religion in Iran
34. ^ Spellman 2004, p. 147
35. ^ "Persian community join the US". Retrieved 18 March 2015.
36. ^ Spellman 2004, p. 103

### Sources

[edit]

* Harbottle, Lynn (2004), Food For Health, Food For Wealth: Ethnic and Gender Identities in British Iranian Communities, The Anthropology of Food and Nutrition, Oxford: Berghahn Books, ISBN 978-1-57181-634-4
* Spellman, Kathryn (2004), Religion and Nation: Iranian Local and Transnational Networks in Britain, Forced Migration, Oxford: Berghahn Books, ISBN 978-1-57181-576-7

## Further reading

[edit]

* Baghaei-Yazdi, Namdar (2002). "Great Britain xii. The Persian Community in Britain (2)". In Yarshater, Ehsan (ed.). Encyclopædia Iranica, Volume XI/3: Great Britain IV–Greece VIII. London and New York: Routledge & Kegan Paul. pp. 275–276. ISBN 978-0-933273-64-1.
* Gharibi, Khadij; Mirvahedi, Seyed Hadi (2021). "'You are Iranian even if you were born on the moon': family language policies of the Iranian diaspora in the UK". Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development. 45 (4): 1017–1032. doi:10.1080/01434632.2021.1935974. hdl:10037/21819. S2CID 236221735.
* Spellman, Kathryn (2002). "Great Britain xii. The Persian Community in Britain (1)". In Yarshater, Ehsan (ed.). Encyclopædia Iranica, Volume XI/3: Great Britain IV–Greece VIII. London and New York: Routledge & Kegan Paul. pp. 273–275. ISBN 978-0-933273-64-1.
* Spellman, Kathryn (2004), "Gendered spaces of exchange: Iranian Muslim religious practices in London", in Titley, Gavan (ed.), Resituating culture, Council of Europe. Directorate of Youth and Sport, pp. 151–161, ISBN 978-92-871-5396-8

## External links

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* The Flight from Tehran: British-Iranians 30 Years On, a series of radio programmes from the BBC
* Iranian Association, Iranian Association was established as a registered charity in 1985 providing information and advice. It is also involved with art and culture, working with the British and Victoria & Albert museums to improve Iranian participation in London's cultural life.
* Iran Heritage Foundation, A non-political charity promoting the history and culture of Iran. It organises everything from lectures and talks to poetry recitals.
* Kayhan London, Kayhan London is a publication for Iranian expats in London and beyond.

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