Multicultchester - Cultural and Ethnic Diversity in Manchester

9308 Views 48 Replies 16 Participants Last post by nitindb, May 15, 2014

nitindb

Discussion Starter · Apr 17, 2014 (Edited)

From the Goths, Emos, Hipsters and Rockers to the Nigerians, Pakistanis, Indians, Arabs and Eastern Europeans and the numerous sub-cultures that make up each of these general groupings. There's no getting away from it; Manchester is one of the world's most socially diverse cities in the world. Recent research has shown that more than 200 languages are spoken in this city of ours:-

http://mlm.humanities.manchester.ac.uk/

Manchester is often also considered one of Britain's most sexually diverse cities in Britain:-

http://www.manchester.gov.uk/info/448/archives_and_local_history/520/lgbt_source_guide

So for all discussions on Manchester's multi-culturalism, immigration, languages, cults, LGBT communities and all things in-between, this is the thread for it.

1 - 20 of 49 Posts

nitindb

Discussion Starter · #2 · Apr 17, 2014

The area close to Oxford Rd station, where large numbers of the early 19th century Irish immigrants stayed, known as 'Little Ireland'.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Ireland

http://openplaques.org/plaques/773

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VDB

· #3 · Apr 17, 2014

^^

The Irish area now appears to be up towards Cheetham Hill/Ancoats

Am I right in thinking that Ancoats also has quite a high number of Italians?

Cherguevara

· #4 · Apr 17, 2014

There are no specifically Irish or Italian areas. Those populations dispersed into the general population of the city decades ago.

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nitindb

Discussion Starter · #5 · Apr 17, 2014

VDB said:
^^
The Irish area now appears to be up towards Cheetham Hill/Ancoats

I know that there is an Irish World Heritage Centre and also a Jewish Museum in Cheetham Hill so the area appears to have always attracted immigrants for some reason.

nitindb

Discussion Starter · #6 · Apr 17, 2014

Cherguevara said:
There are no specifically Irish or Italian areas. Those populations dispersed into the general population of the city decades ago.

Which is what eventually happens after a certain amount of time has passed. The older immigrants move on to greener pastures, and new immigrants seem to take their place. Little Italy in New York is an example, where it has been completely consumed by the China Town. Rusholme, for example, was an area where a lot of Pakistanis lived and had restaurants to cater for that population but it now appears to be increasingly filled with middle eastern immigrants along with the Eastern Europeans.

paul62

· #7 · Apr 17, 2014

VDB said:
^^

Am I right in thinking that Ancoats also has quite a high number of Italians?

There was, but it was a long time ago now.

http://www.ancoatslittleitaly.com/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/legacies/immig_emig/england/manchester/

nitindb

Discussion Starter · #8 · Apr 17, 2014

VDB said:
^^
Am I right in thinking that Ancoats also has quite a high number of Italians?

I see that there is a whole website regarding this. So at some time in the distant past it most probably was a hub for Italians. I wonder where Mr Faranti was based in Manchester?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferranti

LongRipple

· #9 · Apr 17, 2014

paul62 said:
There was, but it was a long time ago now.

http://www.ancoatslittleitaly.com/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/legacies/immig_emig/england/manchester/

This is the Manchester Italian Association one of the oldest in the UK.
http://mia1888.org/

They have their own parade through the city in traditional costume (of several hundred people) every June.

The Ice Plant Apartments Ancoats were formed from the old Blossom Street Ice Company which was created by the Italians to make their ice-cream. They also subsequently sold ice to the fish markets around Smithfield and helping to improve general refrigeration in the city.

The ice cream man on Market St is descended from Bernardo Scapaticci who began trading in 1898.
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LongRipple

· #10 · Apr 17, 2014

nitindb said:
I wonder where Mr Faranti was based in Manchester?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferranti

Sebastian Ziani de Ferranti was a Scouser who lived mainly in London!

Ferranti operated in Hollinwood, Oldham from 1896 adding sites in West Gorton, Wythenshawe (off Kingsway) and Moston. The company later sold the Ferranti Mark I or "Manchester Electronic Computer" desinged and built in the city.

The Museum of Science & industry hold an archive.
http://www.mosi.org.uk/media/33870530/ferrantiltd.pdf
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VDB

· #11 · Apr 17, 2014

Fantastic. I wonder where they all went?

I have two friends of Italian descent - both in and around the Bury area, although I bet if there was an Italian area somewhere in Manchester it would be in South Manchester.

I heard once that there's a bit of a concentration of French people in and around Monton, could have just been local folklore though.

Folly

· #12 · Apr 17, 2014

Don't think i've ever heard that.

http://www.theguardian.com/news/dat...us-2011-england-wales-diversity-languages-map

The biggest grouping of French if there is one looks to be in Altrincham/Trafford looking at this map - and out into Cheshire. Quite interesting that map though, obviously Chinese dominates the city centre, but with quite a lot of arabic being spoken in the south central area of town too. Somali in Hulme/Moss side. Urdu and a smattering of Hindi in Old Trafford, then we have arabic again in Rusholme and Urdu beyond in Longsight.

Is it me or is there a cluster of Welsh (?) in East Oldham too?

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nitindb

Discussion Starter · #13 · Apr 17, 2014 (Edited)

VDB said:
Fantastic. I wonder where they all went?

I have two friends of Italian descent - both in and around the Bury area, although I bet if there was an Italian area somewhere in Manchester it would be in South Manchester.

I think it's safe to say that if it were not for these Italians, we probably wouldn't have had ice cream vans which are an evolution of the hand drawn or horse drawn carts of the 'Hokey Pokey' men who originally used to sing (probably in Italian) to catch attention. Sivori's ice cream got established in Levenshulme, and Granelli's in Macclesfield:-

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.../sivori-family-name-returns-to-the-ice-852822

http://www.ldhimages.co.uk/granelli-family-tree-macclesfield-branch/the-start-of-the-business/

And we've got these ice cream van manufacturers and exports based in Crewe:-

http://www.whitbymorrison.com

I think there was quite an Italian presence in Cheshire because we have the Arighi Bianchi furniture store in Macclesfield too; a Grade II listed building:-

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VDB

· #14 · Apr 17, 2014

It'd be good to know what everybody on the forum is "made up" of.

I'm 1/8th Scottish, 1/8th Brazilian (insignificant, I know) and 1/4 Austrian.

The Austrian side of the family came over in 1938 just before Germany annexed Austria, my family were Jewish (I still have the crooked nose! :lol

tomegranate

· #15 · Apr 17, 2014

I'm proper exotic, my mum and dad are from the same farming village in Worcestershire. My maternal granddad was from a far-off land though... Sunderland.

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paul62

· #16 · Apr 17, 2014

2

nitindb said:
I think it's safe to say that if it were not for these Italians, we probably wouldn't have had ice cream vans! Sivori's ice cream got established in Gorton, and Granelli's in Macclesfield:-

I think it`s safe to say that if it wasn`t for immigration, we would all still be on fish and chips. Nothing wrong with fish and chips of course, but I`m glad there`s a much wider choice.

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urbnist

· #17 · Apr 17, 2014

Take a trip to the new Archive+ area in the Central library.

On prominent display is a large directory from the mid-to-late 1800s charting the many hundreds of foreign merchants that made Manchester their home and traded from the city during this period. Dozens of different nationalities are present but the largest contingents are those from Germany and Greece.

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paul62

· #18 · Apr 17, 2014

VDB said:
It'd be good to know what everybody on the forum is "made up" of.

I'm 1/8th Scottish, 1/8th Brazilian (insignificant, I know) and 1/4 Austrian.

The Austrian side of the family came over in 1938 just before Germany annexed Austria, my family were Jewish (I still have the crooked nose! :lol

Is there any such thing as 100% English?

VDB

· #19 · Apr 17, 2014

paul62 said:
Is there any such thing as 100% English?

It's probably impossible considering we're an island. Even 100 years ago before the main body of immigration, Britain had a large number of Jews who had migrated over during the various persecutions throughout the 1800s, and then of course we're all made up of Danes, French people and German people too.

Every part of the country has its own descendants as well - for instance I think the story of the Celts is awesome: ever wondered why the Scottish, Welsh and Scouse accents all sound pretty similar? It's because, when the Vikings invaded Britain in East Yorkshire, the Celts fled as far away as they could - hence Cornwall (which had its own Celtic language), Scotland, Wales, Ireland and Liverpool all have similar-sounding accents, they descend from those Celts.

Then a lot of the place names (Thorpe, Ham etc) on the East Coast are descended from Viking influence, and the -son on the end of people's names is also a Viking influence. The Yorkshire accent also sounds very similar to Old English/Germanic English. Listen to this excerpt of Beowulf being read in Old English, it sounds very German of course but you can tell with the elongated vowels "aaay" instead of "ay" that it has a Yorkshire twang to it.

Indeed the Old English standard language was that of Yorkshire before it shifted to the universities and professionals around London.

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LongRipple

· #20 · Apr 17, 2014

Folly said:
The biggest grouping of French if there is one looks to be in Altrincham/Trafford looking at this map - and out into Cheshire.

Has been for a while:

After 1066 (and all that) William the Conqueror struggled to reign in the independent Cheshire landowners but once he did he gave all their land away to Norman barons. This might explain Cheshirites (Cheesisters?) general political neutrality with a reluctance to engage with either side during various Civil Wars and political skirmishes- it may also explain why the women are all stick thin, high maintenance and live off salad.

To another anecdote, I did once go to an open mike in Chorlton where the Bluegrass singer from Broughton claimed to be descended from the one of Buffalo Bill's Salford Sioux entourage- that probably says all you need to know about Chorlton though!
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