Transatlantic slavery’s role in shaping Manchester to be explored in exhibition

Guardian editor-in-chief Katharine Viner tours the Science and Industry museum in Manchester, where the new exhibition exploring the city’s links to the cotton trade and enslaved African people will be held. Photograph: Christopher Thomond/The Guardian

The role transatlantic enslavement played in shaping Manchester is at the heart of a new exhibition developed in partnership by the Guardian and the city’s Science and Industry Museum.

The exhibition is the first time the museum, which tells the story of Manchester’s transformation into the world’s first industrial city, has put the links between enslaved African people, cotton and the city at the centre of a display.