IN-PERSON Manchester Livable Cities

Abstract

Len Johnson was a boxer and communist political activist that largely faded from British collective memory. Born to a Sierra Leone Creole father and an English mother of Irish heritage, Johnson was considered one of the finest middleweight boxers of his era, becoming the first non-white boxer to hold any major title during the sport’s period of racial segregation. In the past decade, a campaign has been waged by boxing fans, Manchester’s Irish community, left-wing political activists, the city’s African diaspora and others to honour Johnson in his home city. It is argued that the memoryscape of Manchester increasingly tells the story of a city embracing a history at odds with mainstream national collective memory. By erecting a statue to Johnson and engaging in public history work, campaigners are tapping into emergent trends in British political culture and positioning previously marginalised stories at the heart of the Manchester sense of place. This piece explores these dynamics and argues that the memorialization campaign for Johnson builds on depictions of Manchester as a city of radicalism. In positioning Manchester’s intellectual heritage as one of working-class struggle and internationalism, campaigners both contrast the city with London’s status as a former imperial capital and identify the UK’s second city as the home of a radical future.