Today, Fordsburg is a major centre of Indian and Pakistani culture, with a large number of halal restaurants.

The suburb was portrayed in the 2012 film Material, which highlighted some of the cultural, racial and religious issues still facing South Africa's post-apartheid society From the earliest days of Johannesburg, the suburb housed a large Jewish community - with the Fordsburg/Mayfair Hebrew Congregation established in 1893 [1] - as well as associated institutions such as a Kosher butchery, chevra kadisha, welfare organisations and Bet midrash.

White workers opposed this policy, and Smuts called in the troops and airforce.

A plaque in Fordsburg Square records the people who were killed there in the last battle of the rebellion.

Writer Herman Charles Bosman and playwright Athol Fugard, as well as anti-apartheid activists such as Yusuf Dadoo, GM Naiker and Nelson Mandela spent time in Fordsburg.