Chapter One: London and Birmingham
UK Cities: A Look at Life and Major Cities in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland
Author: David William
Paperback: 180 pages
Publisher: New Africa Press (13 October 2010)
ISBN-13: 9789987160211
London and Birmingham
THE UNITED KINGDOM has some of the most well-known cities in the world. They include London and Birmingham. They're are the two largest cities in the UK. Both are in England.
The United Kingdom also is one of the most urbanised countries not only in the world but even in Europe itself which is the most urbanised and industrialised continent.
Its cities are also powerful magnets drawing many immigrants from other European countries, not just from the Third World.
There are, at this writing, 66 officially designated cities in the United Kingdom. 50 of them are in England alone.
The 30 largest cities in the United Kingdom in descending order of population size are London, Birmingham, Glasgow, Liverpool, Edinburgh, Leeds, Sheffield, Bristol, Manchester, Leicester, Cardiff, Coventry, Kingston upon Hull, Bradford, Belfast, Stoke-on-Kent, Wolverhampton, Nottingham, Plymouth, Southampton, Reading, Derby, Aberdeen, Dudley, Newcastle on Tyne, Northampton, Portsmouth, Luton, Preston, and Milton Keynes.
Almost all of them are in England except Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen which are in Scotland, Cardiff and Swansea in Wales, and Belfast in Northern Ireland.
We're going to look at some of the largest cities in the United Kingdom and at their demographic composition and other aspects of these urban centres.
The list is representative of the constituent parts – the countries – which constitute the United Kingdom and therefore excludes most of the cities in England.
Still, England dominates the list since it has the largest number of cities in the United Kingdom.
We focus on London and Birmingham in this chapter. And we're going look at some of the other cities in the chapters that follow.
London
London is the largest city in the United Kingdom. It occupies more than 620 square miles and is the most populous city in the European Union.
It's also one of the European Union's most densely populated areas, only surpassed by Copenhagen in Denmark, Brussels in Belgium, and Paris in France.
London is the 25th largest city and the 17th largest metropolitan region in the world. And it ranks 4th in the world in the number of billionaires in terms of US dollars. It's also one of the most expensive cities in the world together with Tokyo and Moscow.
London's most prominent geographical feature is the Thames, a navigable river flowing from the southwest to the east across the city. It's a tidal river and London is vulnerable to flooding.
Because of the temperate marine climate which prevails over much of Britain, temperatures in London are not extreme. Summers are warm with average high temperatures of 73 °F and lows of 57 °F. But they sometimes exceed 77 °F on many days.
Winters are chilly but rarely below freezing. Daytime temperatures average 36 – 46 °F. And spring has mild days and cool evenings. Snow is not common. One of the reasons, apart from the mild climate, is that heat from the urban area can make London up to 9 °F hotter than the surrounding areas in winter. But the city sometimes gets light snow a few times a year.
London is the capital of the United Kingdom and also the capital of England. And it once was the ninth-largest city in the world.
It's about 2,000 years old and is composed of two ancient cities: The City of London and the City of Westminster.
The City of London, which is also simply known as The City, is the business and financial centre of the entire United Kingdom and was the original settlement established by the Romans who invaded England in 43 A.D. The name London itself is Roman and the original settlement was named Londinium by the Romans.
The City of Westminster is where parliament and most of the government offices are located. Buckingham Palace which is the official residence of the royal family is also located there.
The City of Westminster comprises most of Greater London's West End and includes the Royal Courts of Justice as well. But it's known for being the seat of the United Kingdom's government more than anything else. And it covers a far greater area than the original old settlement of Westminster.
According to 2005 estimates, the City of Westminster had a population of about 220,000. At least 71 per cent of the people were white, 16 per cent were of Asian origin, 7 per cent were black, 6 per cent mixed, and 4 per cent people of other ancestries.
Also many of the most famous sites in London are located in the City of Westminster. Besides Buckingham Palace, and Houses of Parliament which are collectively known as the Palace of Westminster, other major landmarks in the City of Westminster include Big Ben and nearby Westminster Abbey.
The Palace of Westminster which is also simply known as Westminster Palace has two Houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom: the House of Lords and the House of Commons. It's located on the north bank of the River Thames close to the government buildings of Whitehall. And Westminster Abbey, a large and mainly Gothic church, is the traditional place of coronation and burial site for English – later British – monarchs.
And one of the most renowned academic institutions in the world, the London School of Economics, is also located in the City of Westminster.
The City of London constitutes the core of what's known as Greater London. It's the nucleus around which the larger city grew through the centuries. It has remained basically the same since the Middle Ages and is now only a very small part of Greater London, a huge metropolis. It's almost one square mile and is also simply known as The Square Mile, besides its other name, The City.
The two names are also used as synonyms for the nation's financial services industry which is mostly based in this inner core of London. So, when people talk about the financial services industry in London, they're also talking about The Square Mile or The City.
In medieval times, what's now known as The City – or The Square Mile – was the full extent of London. It was also a separate entity from the nearby settlement of Westminster which later became the City of Westminster and an integral part of Greater London like The Square Mile. Both The City – or The Square Mile – and the City of Westminster – are the most historical parts of Greater London which is also simply known as London.
The City of London – or The Square Mile – is still part of London's city centre but most of London's metropolitan operations apart from the financial services are centred in the West End.
The City (The Square Mile) is a major business and and financial centre and is known as the richest square mile in the world. Its resident population is less than 10,000 but has 340,000 professional workers who go in and out making the area's transport system extremely busy during peak times. Most of them work in the financial sector and The City ranks on par with New York City as the leading centre of global finance.
The City – whose longer name is The City of London as opposed to Greater London of which it's an integral part – is the second smallest city in Britain in population and size after St. Davis in Wales. Its size was constrained by a defensive perimeter wall, known as London Wall, which was built by the Romans – founders of London – to protect their strategic port city. But the old city wall is no longer the boundary of The City whose jurisdiction has expanded slightly through the years.
The boundary remained fixed until 1993 when it expanded slightly to the north, east and west adding small parcels of land from surrounding boroughs. And the Tower of London has always been outside The City but the Museum of London is located there. The Natwest Tower, which is the first skyscraper in the United Kingdom and which is now known as Tower 42, is also in The City. It was built in the 1970s.
Other major buildings and institutions in The City include St Paul’s Cathedral, The Old Bailey, Mansion House, Smithfields Market, the Guildhall, 30 St. Mary Axe (The Gherkin), and Broadgate Tower.
The City has been a separate administrative entity since 886 A.D. during the reign of Alfred the Great. And although The City is extremely busy during weekdays, large sections of it remain very quiet on weekends, especially in the eastern part.
All the biggest financial institutions in the United Kingdom are located in The City. They include the London Stock Exchange, the Bank of England and the world-renowned insurance company, Lloyd's of London. More than 500 banks have offices in The City and in the Docklands which has been an alternative financial centre for London since the 1980s. As UK's financial centre, The City – only a one square mile area – contributes about 2.5 per cent of the gross national product (GNP).
London, or Greater London, has a population of more than 7.5 million, according to 2006 statistics. Throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, it was the most populous city in the world until it was surpassed by New York in 1925. Its continuous urban area extends beyond the borders of Greater London and has more than 8 million people.
And although it's predominantly white and Anglo-Saxon, it also has a significant population of ethnic and racial minorities. About 25 per cent of the people who live in London belong to minority groups. And they're all known as Londoners.
People of more than 270 national backgrounds constitute a large segment of London's population. Many of them have family roots in the Caribbean, in African countries, in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh all of which were once ruled by Britain. Bangladesh was once part of Pakistan and was known as East Pakistan, separated from West Pakistan by India. The former West Pakistan is now simply known as Pakistan.
London has the largest non-white population among all the cities in Europe. It's also the most cosmopolitan.
More than 300 languages are spoken in London, making it the most linguistically diverse city in the world, with New York City being its only nearest rival.
According to the 2001 census, 76 per cent of Londoners were white; 10 per cent Indian, Bangladeshi or Pakistani; 5 per cent black African; 5 per cent black Caribbean; 3 per cent mixed race; 1 per cent Chinese.
And according to census estimates in 2005, 69.9 per cent of Londoners were white. Of those, 58.2 per cent were native white Britons, 2.6 per cent Irish, and 8.8 per cent other whites, mostly other Europeans.
At least 12.9 per cent were people of South Asian descent: Indian – mainly Punjabi, Hindi, Tamil and Gujarati; Pakistani, Bangladeshi (Bengali) and other South Asians mostly Sri Lankan as well as other South Asian ethnic groups.
About 10.8 of Londoners were black during the same period in 2005. Of those, 5.5 per cent were black African mostly from Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana, South Africa, Somalia, Uganda and Zimbabwe. And 4.4 per cent were Black Caribbean mostly from Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago and Barbados. And 0.8 per cent were other blacks.
About 4.3 per cent of Londoners were of mixed race, 1.4 per cent Chinese, and 1.9 per cent were members of other ethnic groups.
The Irish were the largest group born outside Britain ( which is England and Wales).
London's population is representative of a wide range of peoples, cultures and religions from round the globe, adding to the diversity within the boundaries of Greater London.
In a survey conducted in January 2005, it was reported that not only more than 300 languages were spoken in London; the city had more than 50 communities whose members were not indigenous or native to Britain. And each of those communities had more than 10,000 members, a total of at least half a million people.
And figures from the Office for National Statistics show that, as of 2006, the foreign-born population of London is about 2.3 million, which is 31 per cent of the city's total and up from 1.63 million in 1997.
The 2001 census showed that 27.1 per cent of Greater London's population were born outside the United Kingdom and a slightly higher proportion of them were non-white, mostly from Asia, Africa and the Caribbean.
The majority of British Jews live in London.
And according to 2008 statistics, 40 per cent of London's total population are members of ethnic minority groups. In fact across London, black (African and Afro-Caribbean) and Asian children outnumber white children by three to two.
If the trend continues London could, after a number of years, become a “Third World” city in terms of demographic composition and may be even culture. Some people claim it's already one. But that's a hyperbolic statement and usually with racist undertones. And it's a minority view.
The people of London speak with different accents, accentuated by the multicultural nature of the city. Traditionally, the London accent has been associated with what's known as Cockney and was similar to many accents of the southeastern part of England. But the accent of a Londoner today is not typical of anything. There are many different accents. It's common for people under 30 to speak with an accent which is a fusion of Cockney, Received Pronunciation, and a variety of accents from different ethnic groups, especially Caribbean. What they speak, together with their new accent which is a hybrid, is known as Multicultural London English (MLE). It also contains a lot of slang.
Multicultural London English which in colloquial terms is also known as Jafaican or Blockney (a term derived from Cockney) is a dialect that emerged in the late 20th century spoken mainly in inner London. It contains many elements from the English dialect spoken in Jamaica and from the languages of West Africa and even of the Indian subcontinent. It has emerged from the kind of English which is spoken as a second language by black immigrants and other non-white immigrants combined with local London English. A mixture of the two has produced Jafaican or Blockney. It's spoken mainly by young people from the inner-city working class and it's very common among Afro-Caribbeans; hence the term Jafaican which means or implies fake Jamaican. It's heavily influenced by Jamaican creole.
And it is, in many fundamental respects, somewhat equivalent to black English in the United States which some American blacks or African Americans also call Ebonics. Black American civil rights leader Jesse Jackson dismissed it as “ignorance” as did many other blacks who like Jesse Jackson emphasised that blacks should learn to speak and write Standard English.
But there are those who contend that black English in the United States is a legitimate form of speech or dialect of English derived from West African languages where the majority of black Americans originated although a significant number of them also came from other parts of Africa including Congo and Angola, and even from East Africa especially from what is now Tanzania and Mozambique to which slave merchants turned their attention after anti-slavery patrols intensified on the West African coast.
One of the most prominent proponents of this theory – that black American English is patterned after West African languages in terms of structure and is a legitimate language by itself – is Geneva Smitherman, an African American and professor of English at Michigan State University in East Lansing, Michigan, in the United States who earlier taught at Wayne State University in Detroit in the same state of Michigan when I was a student at that school in the early and mid-seventies before I went to Aquinas College in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Earlier I had attended school in Tanzania – in Rungwe District, Songea, and Dar es Salaam – where there's no such thing as black English as there is in the United States and even in Britain where Jafaican is the equivalent of what many black Americans call Ebonics and of which Professor Geneva Smitherman is one of its leading scholars.
She's also the author of a number of books on black English, including Talkin and Testifying: The Language of Black America, Talkin that Talk: African American Language and Culture, Word from The Mother: Language and African Americans, Black Talk: Words and Phrases from the Hood to the Amen Corner among others.
These proponents also contend that black American English has its roots in slavery when African slaves developed their own form of speech and is therefore a legitimate form of English or dialect.
So, both Ebonics – or black American English – and Jafaican have supporters and opponents. And in the case of Jafaican or Blockney or Multicultural London English, its use and acceptance has even transcended race unlike black American English which is spoken almost exclusively by blacks although there a few young whites who try to imitate black speech patterns and sometimes even use black English vocabulary.
And like Jafaican or Blockney, Cockney also has its roots in the working class, but the white working class, especially those who live in the East End in London. But non-white people born and brought up there also speak with this accent and vocabulary – Cockney vocabulary – which are also associated with low levels of education and not just poverty.
And Cockney is no longer restricted to the eastern part of London. East Enders may be Cockneys but not every Cockney is an East Ender. Many Cockneys live in other parts of London and other parts of the United Kingdom as well. And their speech pattern and vocabulary have also influenced other dialects in varying degrees in different parts of the United Kingdom. For example, in many towns in Essex, there's strong influence of Cockney on local speech.
Cockney speakers have a distinctive accent and dialect and frequently use Cockney rhyming slang. They have also incorporated into their dialect words and phrases from other languages such as Yiddish, a High German language of Jewish origin which is written with the Hebrew alphabet as opposed to the Latiin alphabet and which originated in the Ashkenazi culture that developed in the Rhineland and then spread to central and Eastern Europe. Cockney speakers have also borrowed from Romany or Romani, an Indo-Aryan language of the Romani people who are also known as Gypsies.
And a fake Cockney accent is known as Mockney, a deliberate affectation – by some members of the middle class and others – of the working-class London Cockney accent. The intention by these Mockneys is to gain popular and street credibility among the working class.
But another trend has also developed in recent years, with many young people who speak Cockney in the inner-city areas of London adopting Multicultural London English, or Blockney or Jafaican, as their main form of English. However, in the eastern outskirts of Greater London, more people speak the traditional Cockney dialect.
And besides being a linguistic term, the term Cockney also has geographical and cultural meaning referring to working-class Londoners, a majority of whom live in the eastern part of the city known as East End. And the people themselves, East Enders, are also known as Cockneys.
London has other distinctions and prominent features as a major city. It's an economic heavyweight.
London contributes substantially to the economy of the United Kingdom. It generates 20 per cent of the country's gross domestic product (GDP), while the London metropolitan area contributes 30 per cent of the total.
More than 85 per cent (3.2 million people ) of the employed population of Greater London work in service industries. And London's largest industry is finance. More than 300,000 people are employed in the financial services in London.
Also, the largest law firm in the world, Clifford Chance, is based in London.
London also dominates global currency transactions, with more US dollars traded in London than in New York, and more euros traded than in every other city in Europe combined.
More than half of the UK's top 100 listed companies (the FTSE 100) and over 100 of Europe's 500 largest companies are headquartered in central London. FTSE is Financial Times Stock Exchange.
More than 70 per cent of the FSTE 100 are located within London's metropolitan area. And 75 per cent of Fortune 500 companies have offices in London.
Media companies are also concentrated in London. And the media distribution industry is London's second most competitive sector after central banking which is the most competitive. Media heavyweights based in London include BBC.
Many national news papers and magazines which also have an international market – such as The Economist, Times, The Guardian – are published in London. They have traditionally been associated with Fleet Street but are now primarily based around Canary Wharf, a large business and shopping area in the city. Fleet Street, named after the River Fleet, was the home of the British press until the 1980s. And although the last major British news office, Reuters, left in 2005, the street's name is still used and is virtually synonymous with “the British national press.”
And not only is London one of the world's business, financial and cultural centres; its global influence in politics, education, entertainment, media, fashion and the arts – together with its status as a world financial, business and cultural hub – has earned it distinction as a global city. And Central London is the headquarters of more than half of the top 100 listed companies in the United Kingdom and more than 100 of Europe's 500 largest companies.
It also has the world's largest insurance and ship broking markets. And it has more foreign banks and investment houses than any other place or city in the world.
London also is a major tourist destination attracting more than 15 million visitors every year from all parts of the world with an annual expenditure – by tourists – of £15 billion which is equivalent to about $22.80 billion. The tourism industry employs 350,000 full-time workers in London alone.
London is the world's most popular city for tourists. In 2007, it was ranked first out of 150 of the world's most popular cities and attracted 15.6 million tourists in 2006 far ahead of other cities. It also attracts 27 million overnight-stay visitors every year.
The city also has the world's oldest scientific zoo, the London Zoo, which is a major tourist attraction. Other major attractions include the world-famous Hyde Park, one of the largest parks in Central London, and its neighbour Kensington Gardens.
The Port of London was once the world's largest but is now the third-largest in the United Kingdom.
The city's World Heritage Sites include the Tower of London; the historic settlement of Greenwich; the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; and the site comprising the Palace of Westminster, Westminster Abbey, and St Margaret's Church.
St. Margaret's Church, which is also known as the Anglican Church of St. Margaret, is located on the grounds of Westminster Abbey in Parliament Square and is the parish church of the British Houses of Parliament.
London's public transport network is one of the most extensive in the world and Heathrow Airport is the busiest airport in the world by international passenger traffic.
And the Government of the United Kingdom which is located around the Houses of Parliament in Westminster is one of the oldest and one of the most well-known in the world. Many government departments are located close to Parliament, particularly along Whitehall. They include the prime minister's residence at 10 Downing Street.
In fact, the British Parliament is known as the “Mother of Parliaments” because most other parliamentary systems around the world have been patterned after it. And its Acts have created many other parliaments, especially in the former British colonies in Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean. And offshoots of Britain such as Australia, New Zealand and Canada owe their existence to Britain and its parliamentary system.
The West End is London's leading shopping and entertainment district and attracts many tourists. Its most prominent features include Oxford Street, home to many shops and department stores, which is almost one mile long and is Europe's busiest shopping area and the longest shopping street in the world; Leicester Square, Covent Garden and Piccadilly Circus all of which draw many tourists.
Another renowned institution, the world-famous Harrods department store, is also located in London's West End district. It's in Knightsbridge just southwest of another world-famous shopping area, Oxford Street. Knightsbridge is known for being an expensive residential area and for the density of its upmarket retail outlets, Harrods being just one of them. Harvey Nichols is another one, offering many of the world's most prestigious brands in menswear and womenswear and other products. It attracts younger shoppers than its rival Harrods but tends to be more expensive.
The West End is also known for its expensive residential areas such as Notting Hill (which is also famous for the Afro-Caribbean Notting Hill Carnival), Knightsbridge and Chelsea. Many properties in those areas sell for tens of million of pounds (or dollars).
The eastern part of the city comprises the East End and East London. The East End is closest to the original Port of London and is home to many immigrants. It has the highest immigrant population in London and is also one of the poorest areas in the city.
London also features prominently in literature. It has been the setting for many works of literature and is associated with the names of many giants in literature including Charles Dickens whose representation of a foggy, snowy, grimy London of street sweepers and pickpockets has been a major influence on people's vision of early Victorian London. Daniel Defoe also wrote about London, especially about the Great Plague of 1665 – 1666 which was historically identified as a bubonic plague and which killed about one fifth of London's population.
William Shakespeare also spent a large part of his life living and working in London. And his contemporary Ben Johnson some of whose works were about London also lived there.
London also is one of the music capitals of the world renowned for classical and popular music.
London's most popular sport is football which is also known as soccer. And it's extremely popular throughout the United Kingdom.
London also has one of the largest bus networks in the world and is world-renowned for its red double-decker buses which are simply known as double deckers.
It also has the largest contact teaching university in the United Kingdom and Europe, the University of London, which comprises 20 colleges and several smaller institutes. It's also one of the most renowned universities in the world and has produced many national leaders in the developing countries of Africa, Asia and the Caribbean.
Many of them went on to lead the independence struggle in their countries after attending school there. They include Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya who also wrote his classic work, Facing Mount Kenya, when he was a student at the London School of Economics (LSE) which is a constituent college of the University of London.
Founded in 1826, the University of London is ranked among the top ten universities in the world and is one of the top three multi-faculty universities in the United Kingdom together with Oxford and Cambridge.
It was the first British university established on secular basis. It was also the first to admit students regardless of race, class, religion, and gender. It also has the most international student body of any university in the world.
Birmingham
Birmingham is the second-largest city – in both area and population – in the United Kingdom after London. It has more than 1 million people.
The city of Birmingham is located near the Black Country iron and coal deposits in central England and is equidistant from Bristol, Liverpool, Manchester and London, which are the main ports of England.
Birmingham is part of the larger West Midlands urban area which has a population of more than 2.3 million and includes several neighbouring towns and cities such as Wolverhampton which historically is part of Staffordshire and is one of the largest cities in the United Kingdom. Staffordshire is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region and its largest city is Stoke-on-Trent.
Birmingham is home to so many different industries that it was nicknamed the "city of 1001 trades". Trade (buying and selling) has been an important part of life in Birmingham for 800 years.
It was also in Birmingham where James Watt and Matthew Bolton founded the Soho metalworks in 1762 and where they designed and built steam engines. Joseph Priestley, who discovered oxygen, also lived for some time in Birmingham. And Joseph Chamberlain, one of the most famous British politicians and statesmen, once served as mayor of Birmingham before he rose to national and international prominence as a leader.
Birmingham sustained heavy damage from aerial bombings by Germany during World War II but subsequently recovered, resulting in modernisation of the city.
It was a hub of the Industrial Revolution which changed the world and earned distinction as “the workshop of the world” in addition to its other distinction appellation, the “city of a thousand trades.”
Its status as an industrial giant has declined through the years but it's acknowledged as a national commercial centre and was named in 2007 as the third best place in the United Kingdom to where one should have or start a business.
Birmingham also is the fourth most visited city – by foreigners – in the United Kingdom. It's also a major international convention centre. And according to the Mercer Index of worldwide standards of living, it ranked 55th as the most livable city in the world in 2007.
Just as the people of London are known as Londoners, the people of Birmingham are known as Brummies, a term which is derived from the city's nickname, Brum. The name Brum itself comes from the city's dialect name, Brummagen.
The people of Birmingham speak a distinctive Brummie dialect, and with a Brummie accent, which distinguishe them from other people in England including their neighbours. For example, the Brummie dialect and accent differ from the dialect and accent used in the neighbouring Black Country.
That's one of the most distinctive features of regional and local identities common throughout the United Kingdom where people from different parts of the country have their own cultural identities – regional, subregional and local – and their own dialects and accents which distinguish them from their fellow countrymen despite their common identity as citizens of the same country.
Although the city suffered heavily from bombings in the Birmingham Blitz of World War II, it recovered quickly and was extensively redeveloped in the 1950s and 1960s, enabling it to regain its status as a major and prominent urban centre in the United Kingdom and in the entire Europe.
It also underwent a major demographic change through the decades after the Second World War because of the large of immigrants who entered Britain from different parts of the world but mainly from the former British colonies in Asia and the West Indies. Many of them settled in Birmingham, their second destination of preference after London, and the cities population reached 1,113,000 in 1951, higher than it is today at 1,010,200 according to estimates in 2005 estimate.
The city has a mild temperate maritime climate with summer temperatures reaching 68°F maximum in July, and winters averaging 40°F in January.
Extreme temperatures and violent weather conditions are rare but the city has been hit by tornadoes before including one in July 2005 which caused a lot of damage in the southern part, destroying homes and businesses.
Birmingham sometimes has heat waves during summer, a phenomenon which has become more common in recent years, while winters have become milder since the 1990s with less snow.
The coldest temperature ever recorded was on 14 January 1982 when it reached -5.4°F at Birmingham International Airport on the city's eastern edge.
Compared to other large metropolitan areas in the United Kingdom, Birmingham is a snowy city because of its inland location – depriving it of oceanic influence of warm currents – and high elevation.
It's also characterised by great diversity in demographic composition, and its cultural landscape is equally diverse. It is, in fact, one of the most heterogeneous cities in the United Kingdom even surpassing London in some respects. For example, it has fewer whites in terms of percentage than London does. According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS) in 2005, Birmingham's white population was 67.8 per cent – contrasted with London's 69.6 per cent during the same period – including 2.7 per cent Irish and 2.1 per cent other whites.
A total of 20.4 per cent was Asian or Asian British, 6.6 per cent black or Black British, 1.1 per cent Chinese, 3.1 mixed race and 1.1 per cent of other ethnic groups.
Its schools also reflect this diversity. A total of 57 per cent of primary school pupils and 52 per cent of secondary school students in the city of Birmingham come from non-white British families. And 16.5 per cent of the city's entire population were born outside the UK.
Birmingham also has many places of interest. They include the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery which has the world's largest collection works by Edward Burne-Jones, an English artist and designer who was born in the city and spent his first 20 years there, later becoming president of the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists; and the Barber Institute of Fine Arts which has one of the world's most detailed and largest coin collections.
The city also has the largest urban nature reserve in Europe, Sutton Park, which is also the largest park in Birmingham. It also has botanical gardens from the Victorian era and numerous public squares in the city centre.
Birmingham also has a great variety of religious buildings because of its diverse population comprising people of different cultural and religious backgrounds from many parts of the world. The Birmingham Central Mosque is one of the largest in Europe. An even bigger mosque was built in the Sparkhill area in the city in the 1990s and is mainly used by the members of the Kashmiri-Pakistani community who settled in Birmingham in large numbers in the 1960s.
Christian churches in the city include St. Phillip's Cathedral which is the Church of England Cathedral for the Diocese of Birmingham, and St. Chad's which is the seat of the Roman Catholic Province of Birmingham. St. Chad's was the first Roman Catholic church to be built in the United Kingdom since the Reformation.
The city library includes an excellent Shakespeare collection, one of the best in the world.
Birmingham's main industries are motor vehicle and bicycle manufacturing, production of electrical equipment, paint, guns and a wide variety of metal products. But they are not the pillars of its economy.
Although Birmingham achieved prominence as a manufacturing and engineering centre, an achievement that be traced back to the Industrial Revolution which literally started in Birmingham with the use of the Watt steam engine fuelled primarily by coal and which propelled the Revolution, its economy today is not longer dominated by heavy industry; it's dominated by the service industry.
About 80 per cent of the city's economic output comes from the service sector as does 97 per cent of its economic growth. And its service sector has a long history in Birmingham. Two of Britain's big four banks Lloyds Bank, now known as Lloyds TSB, and the Midland Bank, renamed HSBC Bank, were founded in Birmingham. Lloyds Bank was founded in 1765, and the Midland Bank in1836. And not only is the city the third best place in the UK to start or relocate a business; it's also the 21st best in the entire Europe.
The tourism industry is another major part of the service sector and in playing an increasing important in the local economy. The Birmingham area also accounts for 42 per cent of UK's conference and exhibition trade spearheaded by the International Conference Centre and the National Exhibition Centre. And its venues for sports and cultural activities also attract large numbers of visitors from the UK and other parts of Europe and beyond.
Also Birmingham's city centre is the second-largest retail centre in the United Kingdom after London. Its shopping centre, the Bullring or Bull Ring, is the busiest in the UK. It also has the largest department outside London, the House of Fraser which has stores across the United Kingdom and Ireland.
Birmingham also has one of only four Selfridges department stores and the second-largest branch of Debenhams in the country, a retailer operating under a department store format in the United Kingdom and which has franchise stores in other countries.
The city has also been ranked as the third best place to shop in the United Kingdom, surpassed only by London's West End, home to Harrods and other department stores, and by Glasgow. And itt has been described as a world-class shopping centre.
An in spite of the decline in the manufacturing sector, Birmingham still has many major industrial plants including Jaguar Cars. Its economic growth rate also has been higher than the national average through the years mainly after the year 2000. But it still has major economic problems especially in the inner city which has the highest unemployment rate in the United Kingdom.
Birmingham City Council is the largest local authority in the United Kingdom and the largest council in Europe. It's also England's largest local education authority overseeing hundreds of schools. It also runs the library service which has 4 million visitors every year.
King Edward School is the most prestigious independent school in Birmingham, and the seven schools of The King Edward VI Foundation are known nationally for their rigorous intellectual discipline, setting very high academic standards; and all the schools consistently rank high nationally in academic achievement.
Birmingham also is the seat of government for the West Midlands region. It's also the newly designated UK headquarters of the National Express which is being moved from London to Birmingham.
The National Express is a UK-based transport group whose current headquarters is London which operates bus, coach, rail and tram services in the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada, Australia, Spain, Portugal and Morocco and long-distance coach routes across Europe. It was established in 1972.
Birmingham International Airport is the sixth-largest airport in the United Kingdom, the third-largest for charter traffic and has the second-largest proportion of business traffic behind London's Heathrow Airport. Also the city's outer circle bus routes are the longest urban bus routes in Europe. And its main railway station is at the centre of the national railway network, considering Birmingham's location in the Midlands, and is one of the most important in the entire United Kingdom.
Birmingham is also famous for its extensive canal system which served industries and businesses in the area during the Industrial Revolution. The canals have been preserved and restored and are a major tourist attraction.
And the Joseph Chamberlain Memorial Clock Tower at the University of Birmingham is the tallest free-standing clock tower in the world.
Also Birmingham has one of the largest higher education colleges in the country which was formed when Sutton Coldfield College merged with North Birmingham College in 2003 and Josiah Mason College in 2006.
Birmingham also is home to three universities and two university colleges. One of them is the University of Birmingham, a 'red brick' university which was the first of the 'red-brick' universities to receive a Royal Charter and thus official university status.
A red-brick university is one of the six civic British universities founded in the major industrial cities of England in the Victorian era which achieved university status before World War II. All 6 red bricks are members of the prestigious Russell Group of universities.
The Russell Group is a collaboration of 20 UK universities which receive two-thirds of universities' research grant and contract funding in the country.
And the term 'red brick' was initially coined because the so-called red-brick universities were new and were therefore seen by the old universities as 'arriviste.' But the description has since ceased to be derogatory with the proliferation of New Universities and the reclassification of the former polytechnics as universities.
The University of Birmingham has been ranked fifth in the United Kingdom for research quality and as one of the leading universities in the world. The Times Higher Education Supplement ranked it 65th in the 2007 world university rankings table. And in 2006-07, it was the fourth most popular English university by number of applications.
The universities and colleges in Birmingham are Aston University, Birmingham City University, Newman University College, and University College Birmingham.
Birmingham also is home to two of the oldest professional football teams in the United Kingdom. They are Aston Villa formed in 1874. The team also formed the first football league in the world in 1888. And the other team is Birmingham City which was formed in 1875.
Birmingham is also the birthplace of heavy metal music, and of Judas Priest, Black Sabbath and its lead vocalist Ozzy Osbourne, and two members of Led Zeppelin.
Also, the 1970s saw the rise of reggae and ska in the city with such bands as Steel Pulse, UB40, and The Beat expounding racial unity with politically leftist lyrics and multiracial lineups, mirroring social currents in Birmingham at that time. And seminal 1980s pop band Duran Duran are also from Birmingham.
Jazz music is also popular in Birmingham and the annual Birmingham International Jazz Festival is the largest of its kind in the United Kingdom. The city also has an internationally renowned symphony orchestra. And the world's oldest vocational dance school, Elmhurst School for Dance, is in Birmingham.
Literary luminaries associated with Birmingham include Samuel Johnson who lived in Birmingham for sometime and was born in nearby Lichfield; and W. H. Auden, an Anglo-American poet who was born in York, England, and who is regarded by many people as one of the greatest writers of the 20th century, grew up in the Harborne area of Birmingham.
Arthur Conan Doyle is also closely associated with Birmingham. He worked in the Aston area of the city. Others are Louis MacNiece, a British and Irish poet and playwright who lived in Birmingham for six years; and Washington Irving who wrote several of his most famous literary works while living in Birmingham.
Other authors who were born in or have resided in Birmingham include David Lodge, Jonathan Coe, J.R.R. Tolkien, Roi Ankhkara Kwabena, who was the city's sixth poet laureate (2001-2002), and Benjamin Zephaniah, a Rastafarian writer and dub poet who was born there but who later moved to London (East End).
Dr. Kwabena was a cultural anthropologist who was born in Trinidad in July 1956. He died at a hospital in London in January 2008 one day after being diagnosed with cancer. Earlier, doctors had been treating him for pneumonia when it was discovered he had lung cancer. In the mid-1990s he served as a senator in the parliament of Trinidad and Tobago.
Zephaniah, a well-known figure in contemporary English literature, was included in The Times list of Britain's top 50 post-war writers in 2008. He was born and brought up in Handsworth district of Birmingham which he called he "Jamaican capital of Europe", and is the son of a Barbados postman and a nurse.
A dyslexic, he attended school but left at the age of 13 because he was unable to read or write, only to flourish later as a literary figure. He has been awarded several honorary doctorates by universities in England including the University of Birmingham. He was also listed by the London Times in its edition of 5 January 2008 as one of the 50 greatest postwar writers.
Birmingham also is home to many national, religious and spiritual festivals including a St. George's Day party. Saint George, a martyr, is one of the most venerated saints in the Anglican Church, Eastern Orthodox Church, Oriental Orthodox Churches and the Eastern Catholic Churches.
The Birmingham International Carnival, which is Caribbean, takes place in odd-numbered years. Thousands of revellers of all races celebrate to carnival music while floats and colourful, vibrant costumes light up the carnival procession route.
And since 1997, Birmingham has hosted an annual arts festival, ArtsFest, which is the largest free arts festival in the United Kingdom. It brings together free short demonstrations of dance, music, film and theatre to concert halls, theatres, and open-air stages in various parts of central Birmingham.
The city's largest single-day event is its St. Patrick's Day parade. It's the second-largest in Europe after the one in Dublin, Ireland.
Other multicultural events include the Bangla Mela and the Vaisakhi Mela celebrating Asian heritage, especially of India. Then there is the Birmingham Heritage Festival which is a Mardi Gras-style event held in August every year. And Caribbean as well as African cultures are celebrated with parades and street performances by a variety of entertainers.
Birmingham also is home to the Electric Cinema, the oldest working cinema in the United Kigdom. Also Star City, a vast entertainment complex, in the northeastern part of the city is the largest leisure and cinema complex in the entire Europe. The city has also been used as a scene or location for many major films and television dramas through the years.
Birmingham is also a national hub for television broadcasting. The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has two facilities in the city. The city centre has offices which are the national headquarters of BBC English Regions, BBC West Midlands, and the BBC Birmingham network production centre.
And the world's longest-running radio soap, The Archers, is recorded in Birmingham for BBC Radio 4.
Birmingham is also home to the National Indoor Arena which is one of the busiest large-scale sporting and entertainment venues in Europe.
Also, many inventions and scientific achievements have taken place in Birmingham through the centuries. They include gas lightning; custard powder; the magnetron; the first ever use of radiography in an operation; Lewis Paul and John Wyatt's first cottonroller spinning machine, and UK's first ever hole-in-the-heart operation which was performed at Birmingham Children's Hospital.
Prominent scientists and inventors from Birmingham include Matthew Boulton, proprietor of the Soho engineering works; Soho Foundry was a factory established in 1795 by Matthew Boulton and James Watt (inventor of the steam engine) at Smethwick on the edge of Birmingham for the manufacture of steam engines.
Another one was renowned chemist Joseph Priestley who lived in Birmingham from 1780 to 1791, and James Watt, an engineer and inventor who is best known as the inventor of the steam engine.
There was also Sir Francis Galton, half-cousin of Charles Darwin, who formulated many important concepts in statistics still which revolutionised the study of statistics and which are still in use today.
Many of these scientists were members of the lunar Society which was based in Birmingham. They met regularly between 1765 and 1813.
The city has a long and interesting history. But what is Birmingham today is mainly a product of the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. And its origin as a town is attributed to the Industrial Revolution more than anything else.
And through the centuries, it grew to be what it is today as one of the most dynamic and most vibrant cities in the United Kingdom and in the entire Europe.
It also has had a profound cultural and industrial impact on British life for centuries, especially since the Industrial Revolution. And it continues to influence national life today.
Birmingham, the capital of the state of Alabama in the United States and which is also the largest city in that state, was named after Birmingham in England. And the two cities share an industrial kinship.
The Industrial Revolution changed lives. It changed societies. It changed the world forever. And it was powered from Birmingham. There's no question that the history of Birmingham is, indeed, an integral part of the history of mankind.
UK Cities: A Look at Life and Major Cities in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland
Author: David William
Paperback: 180 pages
Publisher: New Africa Press (13 October 2010)
ISBN-13: 9789987160211