Ethnic diversity in London and other British cities

[muppet]

You don't have to be full white to have Irish ancestry btw, for example the Caribbean diaspora is mostly mixed, with Irish settling on practically every island. Those stats are from 2001 (and 2010?), so likely lower now, I've heard it's down to about a third for London.

I.e. on the Irish in the Caribbean:

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com...the-caribbean/


Sidenote: interesting how St Patrick's is celebrated around the Caribbean. In Montserrat, which at one point was 70% Irish about 350 years ago, they still stamp shamrocks on the passports:

[Docere]

A polyglot global city like London isn't going to be 77% anything.

And three times as much Irish ancestry in the south of England than in Scotland? That makes no sense.

This is obviously a junk survey. Even the authors say so:

But although many hold passionately to their Irish roots, more than half are probably exaggerating or even lying, say the authors of the report.

The last British census, carried out in 1991, suggested five million British people either had an Irish parent or grandparent - less than one in ten of the population.

Dr Roy Bradshaw of Nottingham University's School of Geography, said: "A quarter of the population claiming Irish roots may be true, but you would have to go a long way back to find it, probably to the first half of the 19th century when a lot of Irish labourers came to Britain to work on the canals.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/1224611.stm

[muppet]

^well I do say one third today sounds about right. The survey was done 20 years ago though, when London also had far less non-white minorities.

Originally Posted by Crawford

Those estimates sound absurd. How could London have 77% Irish ancestry?

London isn't even 77% British white. Ireland has never been a heavily populated island. London didn't even get heavy Irish immigration until the postwar decades. Nowadays the migration is more likely reversed, as the UK has heavy net losses to the EU since Brexit.

London didn't get heavy Irish immigration until the postwar years ? Did you literally just decide that????

Big waves in the 1600s (only 40% of the population stayed after war and famine), again in the 19th Century, notably during the Potato Famine 800,000 emigrated to Britain (200,000 a year - proportionally this would equate today to about 700,000 refugees arriving annually), with 100,000 coming to London. Almost overnight London, Liverpool and Manchester became known as 'Little Ireland's'

Ireland's population halved from over 8 million due to starvation and emigration, and today is still a fraction of what it was (before the famine it was about half the population of Britain). 10% of the country moved to Britain in just 4 years. Within a decade of the famine, Irish formed 22% of Liverpool, 18% of Glasgow and 19% of Dundee.

[Docere]

Irish-born, 1861

London 106,879 3.8%
Liverpool 83,949 18.9%
Glasgow 63,574 15.8%
Manchester 52,076 11.3%

https://thewildgeese.irish/profiles/...sus-statistics

Liverpool and Glasgow were proportionately far more Irish than London in the 19th century.

It's true London's Irish community is more of a 20th century phenomenon, but at no time were Irish immigrants even near the share of the population they were in Liverpool and Glasgow (even though their sheer numbers were larger).

London was 5.4% Irish-born in 1961.

[muppet]

Yes but we're talking about ancestry still. 100,000 in 1861, as a snapshot in time does indicate that they still will procreate and spread -bearing in mind there were successive waves before, and for centuries, not to mention after. The majority still ended in London - to reiterate as a snapshot - but far longer than the other cities historically.

[Docere]

This makes no sense.

Yes, these figures don't include all Irish ancestry. But mass Irish immigration to Britain began in the 19th century. Most in the mid-19th century would have been first- or second-generation. You can also see the proportion in Liverpool is 5x higher than London.

There's far more ethnic groups and nationalities today than there were in the 19th century. The pie may have grown but there's far more slices (hence lower percentages).

So how is polyglot London as Irish as Liverpool whose population is far more homogeneous? I don't get it.

How is London 3x as Irish as Glasgow? Again, makes no sense.

Let's put it this way. There were 260,000 Irish-born in NYC (Manhattan and Brooklyn) in 1860, 24% of the population. Their percentage is down since then because there's far more diversity in the population now than there was then, even with natural growth and 20th century Irish immigration. Or are we supposed to think NYC is even more than 77% Irish.

[Docere]

Irish Americans make up about 20% of the population of Massachusetts. Is southern England really 4x as Irish as Massachusetts?

[JMKeynes]

London has very few “white” ethnics. The Jewish population is a fraction of New York’s, and they’re generally more assimilated into British culture than Jews are in NY, for example.

[Docere]

Of course London is important as an Irish center. London has more Irish-born than any city outside of Ireland. And probably has since the 1960s.

[muppet]

Originally Posted by Docere

This makes no sense.

Yes, these figures don't include all Irish ancestry. But mass Irish immigration to Britain began in the 19th century. Most in the mid-19th century would have been first- or second-generation. You can also see the proportion in Liverpool is 5x higher than London.

There's far more ethnic groups and nationalities today than there were in the 19th century. The pie may have grown but there's far more slices (hence lower percentages).

So how is polyglot London as Irish as Liverpool whose population is far more homogeneous? I don't get it.

How is London 3x as Irish as Glasgow? Again, makes no sense.

Let's put it this way. There were 260,000 Irish-born in NYC (Manhattan and Brooklyn) in 1860, 24% of the population. Their percentage is down since then because there's far more diversity in the population now than there was then, even with natural growth and 20th century Irish immigration. Or are we supposed to think NYC is even more than 77% Irish.

As mentioned before London has been accepting large waves of Irish since before the other cities, who largely received their waves in the 19th Century before stopping. In terms of sheer numbers London received more than any other in the country, albeit in smaller proportion due to the size of London (a population already larger than the country they were fleeing), but also stretching from far before.

In medieval times London was about a third foreign born, as high as it is today.

In the 1640s, 60% of the island died or left from British conquest and engineered famine, sending the first significant waves.

In the 1740s, engineered famine again killed 1/5 of the population sending another

In the 1830s a labour wave to build the railroads (just before the 1840 famine), with 40% of the army Irish born; Archway became a nexus.


Also the waves continued after the 19th Century.

The censuses show the ongoing wave of Irish immigration, the majority ending up in London. Although the other cities had their big waves in the 1840s, London's continued -as reminder the majority of Irish emigres ended up in the city, whose biggest waves were in the 70s (for ill-fated labour) and 90s (EU accession with opening borders, Ireland then was the poorest state in Western Europe):





The result today shows the 6 million identifying as Irish ancestry are concentrated in 4 areas, London, Birmingham, Manchester-Liverpool, Glasgow-Edinburgh (also a reminder you can also identify as Caribbean ancestry, British ancestry etc on the census alongside - they rightfully overlap, having a single Irish great grandfather in the mix or an Irish surname from 300 years ago in Jamaica doesn't mean it cancels out all your other ancestry):







Today although places like Liverpool have 75% Irish ancestry somewhere, London and Manchester have about a third. I imagine the 77% from 2001 is doable, especially if you take into account the Caribbean population, then at its peak as the city's largest minority (today more than halved), and just after the largest ever wave of Irish emigration had arrived. Also before the largest waves of migration the country has ever seen, from EU, Lat Am and Africa. As reminder this is based on ancestry, and London's population has grown nearly 30% since then, or over 2 million largely from abroad.

[muppet]

in short London more than the other cities (Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow, NYC)

1. Had waves before

2. Continued with waves after

3. 2001 marked just after London's largest ever Irish wave and the peak of the Caribbean population, and before the city grew by 30% in population, mostly from abroad

4. gentle reminder, this would be ancestry not Irish born -which overlaps beyond the White population and can be traced back centuries further, notably having Irish surnames or family trees etc

[Crawford]

London is 77% Irish bc of all the Jamaicans and Polish and Indians and Gulf Arabs. On that note, Vermont is 100% African due to Africa being the cradle of civilization and therefore all Vermonters hailing from sub-Saharan Africa. The things one learns on SSP...

[lio45]

I wouldn’t be surprised if genetic testing of all Londoners showed that only 23% are entirely devoid of the faintest trace of Irish ancestry.

Similarly, it’s well-known that most Québécois are like Elizabeth “Pocahontas” Warren, which of course isn’t the same statement at all as “most of the current population of the province is Native American as of 2022” (true for Nunavut, but not for Quebec).

[Docere]

This was a survey done for Guinness and even the authors don't take the figures very seriously.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by lio45

I wouldn’t be surprised if genetic testing of all Londoners showed that only 23% are entirely devoid of the faintest trace of Irish ancestry.

Similarly, it’s well-known that most Québécois are like Elizabeth “Pocahontas” Warren, which of course isn’t the same statement at all as “most of the current population of the province is Native American as of 2022” (true for Nunavut, but not for Quebec).

It's actually pretty difficult to determine the difference genetically between English and "Celtic" Britons in general. Modern DNA testing suggests the Saxon percentage of the English population is small (no more than 20%) and something like an Irish person with some distinct Norse ancestry is rather close.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by eschaton

It's actually pretty difficult to determine the difference genetically between English and "Celtic" Britons in general. Modern DNA testing suggests the Saxon percentage of the English population is small (no more than 20%) and something like an Irish person with some distinct Norse ancestry is rather close.

Even better then, as it makes it even more realistic that only 23% of present-day Londoners would get the result “no Celtic DNA detected at all” (due to being pure Polish, Pakistani, Korean, etc.)

[Docere]

Less than half of London's population is white British or Irish.

[muppet]

does anyone even bother reading my posts?

[Docere]

Yes, but I don't see how the West Indian community increases the number with at least some Irish ancestry to 77%.

Should Jamaicans in the Bronx be counted as Irish too?

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Docere

Yes, but I don't see how the West Indian community increases the number with at least some Irish ancestry to 77%.

Should Jamaicans in the Bronx be counted as Irish too?

Wait. Seriously? Irish ancestry doesn't mean identify as ethnically Irish. Jamaica had a pretty large Irish population in the colonial era.

Irish people in Jamaica or Irish Jamaicans, are Jamaican citizens whose ancestors originated from Ireland. Irish people are the second-largest reported ethnic group in Jamaica, after Jamaicans of African ancestry. Most Jamaicans with Irish ancestry also have African ancestry.

Read more here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_people_in_Jamaica