philadelphia

[bruinkid]

hey guys,
i'm from the west coast, and i was just wondering if philadephia was a city of diversity in terms of ethnic backgrounds.

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[chopsuey]

hmmm....how to discuss this and be P.C.?? ah, whatever...here ya go:

Philly is pretty diverse. in particular, in terms of minorities, there is a very large African American population. depending on where you go, African Americans are probably the majority or close to (i.e. west philly). Other than that, the other minorities are pretty well represented. I wouldn't come here anticipated the same kind of neighborhood diversity as in NYC (our chinatown, for example, is generally a source of disappointment to people expecting something similar to the one to NYC), but the city is certainly not, shall we say, "vanilla." one minority which i wouldn't associate with philly is latino/latina....i could definitely be wrong on that, but that's just been my impression over the last 21 years.

the other thing is that there are a LOT of people who commute into the city, so philly at any given time has people from the surrounding suburbs altering whatever it's actual demographics are, but i guess they would be there if you came to school here, so it really won't come into play too much unless you're looking at the patient population. the commuters are mostly caucasian, though i'm a contradiction to that statement.

ok, i'm done rambling...
hope that helps...any more specific questions, and maybe i could answer you better.

 

[jot]

hey i live in philly - have for a while, know somehting aobut the area and surroundings. if you consider the whole area inlcuding suburbs, it is an extremely diverse population. however, one will find that for the most part that many of the ethnic groups live in distinct locales, rather than an evenly heterogeneous mix. even though these people all work in more or less the same places, i think people manage to minimize cross-cultural interaction to some extent - its nothing like the mixing you would see in nyc. i went to highschool in a suburb as the 1 of 3 indian kids in a 2000 person highschool, though the next district over had tons of indian kids. kind of a testamony to the geographical self-segregation - which you see in many places. regardless, i like the city, there is a ton to do and see, and you will have no problem finding the diversity you (and i) are looking for, especially if you are going to school there. alright - enough. goodluck
-jot

 

[DW]

Originally posted by chopsuey
one minority which i wouldn't associate with philly is latino/latina

well, its not like L.A. or anything, but there's an appreciable hispanic component of the city, in the kensington/fishtown areas, along with a big latino sect right across the ben franklin in camden.

there are definitely self defined cultural blocks of the city (italian market, university city, chinatown, etc), so while kind of fragmented (not necessarily outright segregated), its a very diverse area culturally and economically. again, its not new york, but its cool nonetheless, and the city is an economic upswing and property/rent/living is cheap relative to other big cities (with the city wage tax and car insurance nonwithstanding)