The Roles We Play
‘Where is home, Mum?’ From the foothills of the Himalayas in the Kashmiri valleys to bustling Green Street in East London, Sabba Khan researches her identity from the global to the local, covering partition, displacement, and clothing choices for an interview as a wannabe student at a prestigious private architectural school.
Khan’s eloquent minimal style and architectural page design illuminates her experiences of growing up as a second generation Azad Kashmiri migrant in East London.
The Roles We Play is Sabba Khan’s debut graphic memoir collecting a series of short essays that explore themes of identity, belonging and memory within the East London Pakistani Muslim diaspora. Together the stories paint a vivid snapshot of contemporary British Asian life and the complex generational shifts experienced within migrant communities today.
Issues of race, gender and class are brought to the forefront in a simple and personal narrative. The title of the book nods to the questions Khan explores: can religion and secularism, tradition and trend, heritage and progression move beyond a limited binary definition and toward a common space of love and understanding, and ultimately toward a pluralistic approach?
Sabba Khan is an architectural designer, artist and maker living in Newham, East London, and one half of architectural practice Khan Bonshek. She is an advocate of increasing working class black and brown representation in the arts and publishing, as well as in architecture and construction. Sabba’s work on The Roles We Play is supported by the Jerwood New Work Fund.
