In his flagship BBC Radio 4 programme Thinking Allowed, the sociologist Laurie Taylor dedicated an entire episode in May 2021 on migrants in London. As part of this broadcast, Taylor and his academic guests reflected on how the historical and contemporary cultural landscape of the city has been shaped by centuries of migration. Describing his own everyday encounters as a Londoner, Taylor (2021) commented:

‘Living in what can be claimed to be the most cosmopolitan city on earth, like many other [white] English residents, I have only occasionally become properly aware of its status as a migrant city through my encounters with such cultural events as the Notting Hill Carnival, the Chinese New Year in Soho, or the Diwali celebration in Trafalgar Square.’

Taylor's (2021) lament of having had only a passing engagement with London's identity as a migrant city sits alongside an acknowledgement of the key role that community-based leisure spaces – such as the Diwali festivities organised every year in Trafalgar Square – play not only in the collective life of migrant and diasporic communities but also in facilitating inter-cultural dialogues and educating ethnic ‘others’ about diverse cultural heritages and directing place-making within the city's urban multiculture. The fact that leisure spaces such as these, often brought into being for a short span of time through the effort of volunteers, prompt ‘many … [white] English residents’ of the city otherwise oblivious of London's long history as a migrant city to ‘become properly aware’ of its rich cultural diversity – or ‘super-diversity’ to use Vertovec's (2007) term – demonstrate the political role of leisure as a site for reinforcing ethnic pride, directing ethnic place-making and facilitating cultural exchanges across ethnic boundaries. Therefore, any discussion of leisure within racialised minority communities needs to pay attention to the cultural politics of leisure: that is to say, the way leisure extends far beyond individual experiences and effects, and is a key player in forging social ties, mediating inter-community relations and carving modes of belonging. The previous chapters have reinforced the need to adopt a relational and processual view of leisure as ‘doing’ – or what I call ‘leisuring’ in short – to fully grasp the dynamics of leisure as a social phenomenon that unfolds within contexts of social inequality and power relations.