Both historically and contemporarily, Manchester has been considered by many as synonymous with resistance and rebellion, the rebellious younger sibling of London. This is a long legacy, and most pertinent to it is Manchester’s lively spirit of working-class political activism.
The history of the burgeoning counterculture in Britain often centres around London, with underground magazines and newspapers such as Oz, Frendz and the International Times being identified as the alternative press of the day. Although London was a countercultural epicentre, the existence of Grass Eye and Mole Express in Manchester illustrate the countercultural movement in Continue Reading
There’s an area in Manchester called Ancoats, also known as ‘Little Italy’. Between 1891 and 1901, 24,382 Italians migrated to Manchester, most of them were found living in Holborn, Saffron Hill and Hatton Garden, but Italians were usually found everywhere in Britain like Glasgow, Edinburgh, Manchester and Birmingham.
Manchester, the heart of evolution and the industrial revolution, including art, business, and cultures. The capital of the North. Although the weather is not very warm and welcoming, the people are!
“I may be a wage slave on Monday / But I am a free man on Sunday.” The final, defiant lines of Ewan MacColl’s The Manchester Rambler are set to a jovial tune that has become a standard for English folk singers; yet one could be forgiven for not having heard it. The song, and the trespass it commemorates, occupy a somewhat niche space in English history – side-lined, along with the entire debate around land ownership and access, by ingrained and unquestioned notions of property.
