England’s cry is a plaintive sigh
Wales Business — By Adam Higgitt on March 1, 2010 7:00 am
Nike and Wayne Rooney's 2006 campaign consciously appropriated hooligan Englishness
ENGLISHMEN now in their sixties and seventies may recall a Scouting youth of at least two public parades a year, one on Remembrance Sunday and one on St George’s Day. By the time those men’s sons swore to do their duty to God and the Queen, only the Armistice was thus marked. Today, their grandsons again turn out for the nearest Sunday to April the 23rd, as well as the somewhat colder November outing. What is remarkable is not that the wheel has turned full circle, but that it ever turned at all. Since 1908, St George has been the patron saint of Scouting.
That, ostensibly at least, is the reason for the restoration of a St George’s Day Parade. It was not so before. Then, English Scouts marched for the Third Century dragon slayer’s patronage of their movement and of their country. The reason that went away is complex, but it is likely that those post-war parades and its attendant sentiment were out of time even then. This was the late apogee of Britishness – how else could an ex-miner from Tredegar name the new universal healthcare the NHS without anyone questioning which nation he had in mind? As English fans celebrated football World Cup glory with union flags and a sea of red, white and blue, the subsumption of Englishness into Britishness seemed total.
But while the English fused their supranational and national identities, the Welsh and Scots merely stacked one discretely upon the other. These distinct Celtic identities gradually grew in relative proportion to a sense of Britishness. But rather than spark an English revival, it only shrivelled the expression of majority national identity yet further. Such was the imbalance that it appeared impolite – if not threatening – for the dominant partner of the British union to assert its distinctiveness. The more the Welsh and Scots made themselves different, the more the English were obliged to uphold British homogeneity. Englishness felt shameful, chauvinistic and atavistic, a far cry from the insouciant, respectable, self-assured assertion of Stanley Baldwin in his famous 1924 speech on the imperishable virtues of his nation. Such was the pariah status of Englishness that even John Major’s 1992 wheeze of substituting “Britain” for “England” in his invocation of his Tory predecessor was instantly exposed and condemned through mockery. We squirmed at the cod nostalgia of warm beer and long shadows on cricket grounds and derided the abuse of Orwell’s irony. But most of all we felt uncomfortable at any assertion, however benign and coded, of English national particularity.
Nevertheless, something else was afoot among the white English working classes. Just as their adoption of British colours at football underscored the end of Baldwin’s easy and superior Englishness, so their increasing use of the flag of St George signalled the start of a new self-conscious and aggrieved national identity. This looked enviously upon the craic of St Patrick’s Day, marvelled ungenerously at the scale of Burns Night, and asked accusingly why the English could not have their day, too. As large metropolitan local authorities blundered into such PR disasters as abjuring the use of the word “Christmas” in favour of “Winterval”, and as Gay Pride marches were afforded seemingly generous public support it was easy for a tiny cohort to depict itself as the voice of a marginalised majority, forced to watch as all shades of ethnicity and identity but their own were commemorated. This, apparently, was the apex of political correctness gone mad. Add a new, New Labour Cabinet apparently dominated by Scots and the introduction of a Parliament to the north and an Assembly to the west and this grievance found a political as well as a cultural locus. The English National Party, officially dead for 20 years but functionally dead for far longer, was resurrected and transformed into the English Democrats. Perhaps tellingly, its Carmarthen was not a Barking or a Leicester, but the well-heeled East Sussex commuter town of Crowborough, where in 2005 it returned its first elected representative. In 2009′s European elections 2% of English votes – nearly 300,000 – came its way.
Most of the English middle class continued to despise and deride what they saw as either parochial or racist expressions of English nationalism, keeping the now mythical “skinhead” alive until the equally distasteful but less threatening “chav” was able to take his place. But some did not. Champions of Englishness among the intelligentsia emerged in the Simons Heffer and Jenkins. Some from the left added their voices too, contrivedly arguing not that the English deserved their voice but that they should not be allowed to feel excluded. And parts of the establishment moved in to try and detoxify the brand. The English Tourist Board launched a St George’s week in 1998 with the avowed aim of making the marking of April 23rd respectable, The General Synod of the Church of England granted the day the status of a full festival for the first time since the Reformation. English Heritage decided that marking the life of a Turk who never set foot on English soil aligned with its conservation and archaeological remit. In 2008, Gordon Brown raised the flag of St George above Downing Street. Then, last year, the London Mayor delighted in cocking a snoot at sneering liberals by holding a festival of sorts. This, we were told, was a civic Englishness, detached from all that hooliganism and nastiness.
And yet the vast bulk of the English are neither repulsed by, nor attracted to, expressions of their national identity. They are merely indifferent. More than four in five respondents to a 2008 poll said they did not mark April 23rd in any way. Morris dancers remain resolutely naff. Euro ’96 killed Merry England. St George’s Day remains an event for brewers and quangos to promote, rather than for the masses to celebrate. And many who do think about it take perverse pride in this apathy. “Nothing makes me prouder to be English than the fact that most of my fellow countrymen neither know, much less care, about marking St George’s Day” says one. This may ironically be a sentiment more fitting of Shakespeare’s Henry V and his demand to “Cry ‘God for Harry, England, and St George’” than for those who bristle at the injustice of a Welsh Assembly but no English Parliament, or who tut at the staging of Diwali celebrations. Theirs is certainly a cry, but for most English it is a plaintive and un-English sigh.
Tags: devolution, England
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52 Comments
I was standing in the shower thinking about this yesterday (as you do), and it’s quite simple really: England has a monarchy.
The patron saints matter more in countries that have long since lost theirs: Wales, Scotland, Ireland. The English people, if they need to be patriotic, rally around the monarchy, not St George – he is surplus to requirements. If the English had no monarchy, they would naturally gravitate towards their patron saint in times of national celebration.
So, in simple terms, St David is our “king”, if just for a day. Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem.
Al, that is an insightful perspective.
Wales could restore its native monarchy, “abolished” with the Statue of Rhuddlan. There is a representative of the Aberffraw Legacy living in Gwynedd today, according to Burkes Peerage, and he may take up the position of head of a Welsh state.
Much is already discussed in the ‘Crown and the Presence of Absence.’
http://waleshome.org/2010/02/the-crown-and-the-presence-of-absence/
Dydd Gwyl Dewi Hapus!
I agree. A plausible explanation.
More than plausible – it demands an article of its own at some future point. Wonder who’s up for it?
“But while the English fused their supranational and national identities, the Welsh and Scots merely stacked one discretely upon the other.”
Beautifully put – wish I’d come up with that sentence.
I remember reading somewhere, but can’t lay my hand on it, that “The English always claim that they are not nationalists. This is the first characteristic of English nationalism.” It’s much too much of a sweeping generalisation for me, and yet somehow it does seem to sum up one strand in the way that some people in England consider the national question.
There is a growing desire to celebrate English national identity, but unfortunately it’s not a desire shared by civic leaders and politicians. The emphasis there, from them, is still very much on Britishness, which they see as a more inclusive identity. For them it is important inculcate in England a strong sense of Britishness in order to keep the Union together. This leaves English identity in something of a political and cultural vacuum.
This was demonstarted by Michael Wills recently, who declared that “Our British identity is different from our English identity…because it is quintessentially plural. And therefore inherently inclusive”.
How did Wills come to this conclusion? It was based upon a YouGov poll commissioned by the Ministry of Justice that found that both whites and minority ethnic respondents have a greater sense of belonging to England than they do to Britain.
Personally I think English national identity is being neglected by our political class because it raises awkward questions. Those awkward questions are more about the nature of Britishness than they are about English identity. Just look at Gordon Brown’s construction of Britishness, it’s a very English idea of British identity based mostly upon an English narrative. Presumably this is Anglo-Britishness allows the English to feel comfortable conflating England and Britain, and negates any need for their own representative national institutions – like an English parliament – because “Englishness” and “Britishness” are basically synonymous.
The big question for the future of the Union is, what if the English decide that English identity and British identity are not synoymous?
I think we will see a lot of introspective self-analysis from our English political class during England’s World Cup campaign, and during the devolution debates in scotland and Wales; especially if we have a Tory Government with no mandate in Scotland that is intent on restricting the voting privileges of Scottish MPs, and to a lesser extent Welsh MPs.
Slowly but irrevocably English identity is disengaging itself from Britishness. The race is on to establish an overarching British national identity based on shared values, to which all four component parts of the UK can subscribe, before English national identity is in total ascendency. In the Moreno test on national identity those opting for only or mainly English have risen markedly from 24% in 1997 to 31% in 1999 and 33% in 2007 whilst those opting only or mainly British only have risen slightly from 23% in 1997 to 25% in 1999 and 26% in 2007.
Yeah. Because the patriotism and nationalism of England revolves around and monarchy, when the crowds line the streets of London, waving their Union Jacks as Liz goes past in her carriage, they are expressing their Englishness in the same way as a Draig-waving, leek-toting person might in Cardiff today.
Which is why “Britishness” is the wrong title for it: it’s not pan-Britishness, just it’s an expression of Englishness. Time they called a spade a spade, and time we stopped taking part in it.
To be fair I’ve been in Edinburgh and seen the Scots line the Royal Mile for the Queen, waving both Union flags and Saltires.
“[…] a very English idea of British identity based mostly upon an English narrative […]” –Toque
From my perspective, the English identity is a central component of ‘Britishness’, and -for most- this is one and the same thing. It is an unconscious association and merging of the two. English institutions are British institutions, and it is presumed that ‘British’ is inclusive of Wales and Scotland.
This is manifest with BBC coverage and programming, which markets itself as ‘British’ but really is England centric- thats where the greatest consumers are located anyway. But this makes them deaf to the concerns of Welsh and Scottish residents who complain that there is no programming cantered on their interests. This is also true when advertisments by leading politicans say that they will make changes to the National Health Services, and advertise that in Wales, but in reality heath care is a devolved authority. Also, when I hear ‘English nationalists’ desire a separate English parliament, I am thinking to myself, you already have one where your MPs out number Welsh, Scottish, and N. Irish MPs by a significant margin!
British = English
As Al said, it is time we call a spade a spade.
You know,
I really can’t believe that we are discussing Englishness/Britishness on St. David’s Day!
“British ” was a rebrand of “English” The package changed but the ingredients were pretty much the same. Otherwise we’d have had, a Briton’s home is his castle, ..on Britian’s green and pleasant land, there’ll always be a Britian, etc etc etc.
I think the British who are English will find it quite easy to re-repackage themselves as English. Think Marathon Snickers Marathon.
However where will such a name change by the British English leave those who identify themselves as British Irish, British Scottish and British Welsh.
British = English
Fair enough David, but that’s not how I see it. This Englishman doesn’t count himself as British.
Increasingly the BBC are differentiating between England and Britain and now actually pick politicians up for talking about “British hospitals” or “teaching British history in British schools” when they are discussing English Health policy or changes to the English national curriculum.
Articles such as this one are still rare but it is now commonplace for the BBC to state the territorial extent of the political stories it covers. The next step for me, as an English nationalist, is to force politicians into saying England, instead of referring to ‘Britain’ or ‘this country’ or ‘our country’ when discussing something that has nothing to do with Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland. Last week the Tories actually put out a story that stipulated that they were discussing England, which was something of a first.
It’s awkward for them to have to do this because they like to pretend that devolution hasn’t happened, unless, of course, they are talking to Scottish or Welsh audiences.
It’s not the English’s fault though. As I have indicated, they take their lead from their royal “role models”. Since the age of Empire, these Royals have had to practice inclusiveness, so that they could not be accused of bias – they were the rulers of multiple countries. Hence the Union Jack . Since that time, Englishness = every part of the Empire. Which, in this day and age of multiculturalism, works on an inclusive level. However, it does nothing to promote Englishness specifically, and infact it kind-of looks down on doing so (one reason that people gravitate towards the BNP I suppose). You can celebrate Englishness if your parents were the Earl Of Suffolk or a farmer from Delhi. All it takes is pride in the country you live in. The English aren’t allowed (almost) to be proud in their country, they have to be proud of the “UK”. Which perpetuates it and exacerbates it
As for the English bias in News, media, documentaries etc, it is evident and you see it every day. Granted, not from Welsh presenters/shows, but from shows produced outside our borders it is there constantly. (Annoying in News bulletins, unforgivable in Historical or factual shows). Which is argument enough for devolved/better Welsh media.
I’m not quite sure why but for me the phrase “St George’s Day” conjures up images of village fêtes, local squires and ex-military types eating suet puddings at St George Society dinners. I wonder (and this is pure speculation) whether St George’s Day went out of fashion from the period of the swinging 60s onwards, marking as it does a decline in deference and class distinctions?
Glanmor Williams has an essay in which he traces how Dewi Sant has been embraced by all Christian traditions in Wales at different times, from early British Christianity through to Roman Catholicism, Anglicanism and Non-conformity. What is the relationship between St George and English Non-conformity and later English Catholicism, for example? Has St George been too much the patron saint of the Establishment to be fully embraced by all?
Scots have been in a Union with us English for 303 interminable years. The Welsh for even longer. Yet, even now the self-styled Celts know nothing about us.
You view us through your Anglophobic monocles and see what you want to see.
I was once English and British. Now I’m English and never British.
The Scots HAVE had a Union with the English for centuries – the whole Act Of Union was just that, the Union of Scotland and England.
The Welsh have NEVER had a union with England, we were just annexed (and included in the Act Of Union by default because of that. We never signed anything). Please redefine your terms.
“I was once English and British. Now I’m English and never British.”
Great!
“I was once English and British. Now I’m English and never British”
The, of course, is the plan of a number of the self-styled Celts.
“The patron saints matter more in countries that have long since lost theirs: Wales, Scotland, Ireland. The English people, if they need to be patriotic, rally around the monarchy, not St George – he is surplus to requirements. If the English had no monarchy, they would naturally gravitate towards their patron saint in times of national celebration.”
So how come the vast majority of Welsh people couldn’t give a flying **** about St David’s Day?
England has a monarchy, Al?? On that basis, so does Scotland. The last English Queen, Anne, was also Queen of Scots. Both Parliaments adopted the Hanoverian succession in 1707 and the Queen is Queen of the UK of GB and NI.
Adam’s article offers a very plausible analysis which most people would agree with but Toque is also right to say that the English are gradually recovering their separate identity.
As one of my school friends, not at all a nationalist or a campaigner, remarked to me two or three years ago when we met up again after 40 years: “In those days, if anyone asked me, I said I was British. Now I tell them I am English.”
The forthcoming Welsh referendum together with possible enhanced devolution for Scotland can only prompt more English voters to ask why Scots and Welsh MPs should vote on Engish-only matters at Westminister. An incoming Tory government is likely to introduce some restrictions, especially if the Tories have only a small majority over Labour. Even if Scots and Welsh MPs retain the privilege it is likely that their numbers at Westminister would be reduced (or further reduced in the case of Scotland). Scotland and Wales will inevitably beocme more peripheral for Westminster which will increasingly come to resemble an English Parliament. Then English MPs may become querulous about Scottish and Welsh ‘lobby fodder’ and others may feel that Scottish & Welsh MPs are seriously underemployed, overpaid and unnecessary.
Those who favour the Union need to find some way of anchoring is continuance in public consent. There were no referendums in 1707, nor when Wales and Ireland were incorporated. Otherwise there will be a sort of ‘continental drift’ until such time as the English themselves decide to detach England from GB. Ironically enough, it may the monarchy that remains the last link.
“self styled Celts”?
Designated Celts surely.
“So how come the vast majority of Welsh people couldn’t give a flying **** about St David’s Day?”
Because the vast majority of Welsh people are heathens?
Actually no, the heathens settled the other side of the dyke, strictly speaking we’re pagans :p
Pagans?
Last time I was in Wales I went to Mwnt Chapel, and I’ve never seen such religious fantaticism – or maybe it’s just that you enjoy a good sing song
“Because the vast majority of Welsh people are heathens?”
Wry smile by me, good comment. I like St Davids Day because it was a celebration of my welshness, but that is very much a civic thing, rather than some made up religious belief.
Celts? the Celts never made it to the British Isles, that they did was all the invention of a Welsh academic.
Re: Toque: I applaud your efforts to encourage the use of ‘English’ by those who really mean issues affecting only England. This is a step in the right direction, but the BBC should truly be devolved to the home nations, with a pm news broadcast tailored to each nation, not subject to receiving the London version of what is important. What this would mean perhaps is a WBC (Welsh Broadcasting Corporation), SBC (Scottish Broadcasting Corporation), and EBC (English Broadcasting Corporation). I can not see any other way for there to be equity between the regions in terms of broadcasting. Because right now those examples you sight are way to far and inbetween to be really effective.
Re: “You view us through your Anglophobic monocles and see what you want to see.” –Stephen Gash
Whoa! Hold on there! I am far from Anglophobic! I would consider myself very much an Anglophile. I love Shakespeare and English literature, English people and the English countryside, and London is great! And I even appreciate your Queen and her son the Duke of Cornwall.
Having said that, I do not agree with the way Wales became the first colony of England. Stephen, it is not right that you paint Welsh nationalists as antagonistic towards England. This is simply not so. It is frustration for generations of inequality which continues today (see discussions on broadcasting, language, amongst others issues) and, for many, being cheated out of a civic national destiny and self determination.
It might be instructive at this stage in the discussion to point out that in a recent (English and Welsh) Dept. of Justice survey, the Welsh respondents emerged as more British-identifying than the English ones.
And, on a related note, I was staggered this lunchtime, when listening to the World at One on BBC Radio 4, when Michael Gove was introduced as the “Shadow Secretary of State for Education for England” – which is what he is, of course; but the BBC hardly ever (or should that be ‘has never’) qualifies England-only government departments and ministers with the epithet ‘English’ or ‘for English’. The presenter topped this off by introducing the Tories’ policies as being ‘for schools in England’. By Gove, I think they get it!
Imagine my incredulity when the next item came on: it was about local council cuts in England!!
Needless to say, Gove himself didn’t utter the ‘E’ word: he and his ilk are next in the campaign to reinstate ‘England’ into the national (i.e. English) vocabulary! That way, we English might actually realise Wales is different, too.
David,
I completely agree with you, the BBC should be devolved. Have you been watching the Seven Ages of England? Errr….I mean Britain. The BBC at least puts out Scottish and Welsh programming, but everything we get in England, even if anglo-centric, is dressed up as British. They just don’t commission anything about England unless it’s a costume drama or something cultural but apolitical.
I’m sure that it’s annoying for you. It’s also annoying for us.
I’d be interested to know what the Welsh nationalists on here think about the Welsh feeling more British than the English. Are you comfortable with dual-identity (Welsh and British), or do you see it as your job to deprive those Welsh people who do feel British of that dual identity?
Toque, the Welsh have always been Britons… In fact, we’re the only Brits on this island (well, apart maybe from our fellow Brythons, the Cornish).
Just found the Gwyn A Williams quote I had in mind.
“Britain has begun its long march out of history, We Welsh look like being the Last of the British. There is some logic in this. We were, after all, the First.”
@ Toque: “I’d be interested to know what the Welsh nationalists on here think about the Welsh feeling more British than the English. Are you comfortable with dual-identity (Welsh and British), or do you see it as your job to deprive those Welsh people who do feel British of that dual identity?”
I have no doubt that there are those who legitimately feel a cross-cultural “British Welsh”, as it were. But I would both need to study that poll, and take that poll with a huge grain of salt. The same question was asked back in 2001 Labour Force Serve which found that:
87 per cent of Wales-born residents claimed Welsh ethnic identity, a similar percentage as in Scotland during the 2001 Census. The question of Welsh ethnic identity was not answered, as the only option for a Welsh (and English respondent for that matter) was “white British, Irish, or Other.”
33 per cent of the total Welsh population is transient, or not born within Wales, and as such did not identify as “Welsh”, and wrote “British” or other in the Labour force survey.
So out of a total population of Wales, 60 per cent of all residents (representing 87 per cent of all Wales-born residents) claimed Welsh ethnic identity, while only 7 per cent more claimed “Welsh and British” as their ethnic identity. The result was 67 percent claimed Welsh or Welsh British as their ethnic identity while 33 per cent claimed “other”.
http://74.125.113.132/search?q=cache:2-IeeIo-jj4J:www.statistics.gov.uk/CCI/nugget.asp%3FID%3D448+Welsh+National+Identity&cd=6&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
The poll you high light counters this argument, so what I would say is that more polls are needed, they need to be vetted, and the census is right around the corner and may offer further more solid results.
Hendre:
Quite right. It should be noted that the peoples of Cambria continued to call themselves Brythoniaid well up until the 12th century, 700 years after they were confined largely west of Offa’s Dyke (which as I stated in another topic/thread was built in consultaton-rather then confrontation- between the Princes of Powys and Gwent with the king of Mercia.)
Cymry did not overtake Brythoniaid until the latter 12th century.
Furthermore, y Cymry were themselves a mix of peoples, Romano-Britons to be sure, but also significant populations of Irish Gaels in Llyn, Dyfed, and Ynys Mon, Northmen in Swansea, Dyfed, and elsewhere, and even Anglo-Saxons in a few locations, certainly!
Interesting. Do you differentiate between national identity and ethnic identity?
If you’re measuring a sense of belonging, which is what the Ministry of Justice/YouGov were doing, then it’s perfectly reasonable and understandable that people who are not of Welsh ethnicity might feel a sense of belonging to Wales. National identity, I would suggest, is strongly connected to ethnic identity, but open to people whose heritage and culture is not Welsh. A ‘sense of belonging’ doesn’t necessarily require people to have a Welsh national identity or Welsh ethnic identity. You do have to watch the wording of these polls.
“Toque, the Welsh have always been Britons” – there’s some truth in that, but I’m sure that a far greater part of the ancient British genome resides in the population of England.
David Llewelyn- ‘British=English’ nonsense! Nowhere is the flag of St George flown so enthusiastically as in Ulster (add a red hand).
I think it’s a shame that the St David’s flag (gold and black), a real Celtic and Welsh symbol, is not given priority over the Roman Drago.
I was interested by the Ministry of Justice survey that Toque and Britologywatch referred to. The form of the wording was:
felt a strong sense of belonging to Britain
Now my answer is that I do feel a strong sense of belonging to Britain, although I would always describe my nationality as “Welsh not British”.
Britain as an island—as a geographical entity—I have no problem with. And as others have said there is a real sense in which, even if only because of the name, the idea of Britain might resonate more with those who are Welsh and Cornish than those who aren’t. (I suppose I have to give the usual health warning that I am not talking in racial terms, just in case anybody misunderstands).
The best parallel I can think of would be Scandinavia. I don’t think many Danes or Swedes would object to being thought of as Scandinavian. However I doubt that any Dane or Swede would use the word Scandinavian to describe their nationality. After Wales has become independent, might we still think of Britain and British in the same way? Independence won’t mean rejecting “Britishness” in terms of the heritage, history and culture we share … after all, don’t we share similar threads with Ireland and Brittany without us having to be part of the same state?
So this, to me, is the really interesting question that I’d like to put to the “English not British” contributors: Do you or could you see yourselves as British in that particular way? And, if you couldn’t, might it explain why the Welsh scored higher in response to the “strong sense of belonging to Britain” question?
Hi MH,
Like you I would never describe myself as British. It’s not a case of “English not British” because I am both, English by choice or self-identification and British in a legal citizenship type of way. But I don’t think of myself as British. If someone were to ask my nationality, or ask “where do you come from?” I would always answer English and England.
I always refuse to put “White British” on forms. I choose ‘other’ and write in English.
I feel some affinity with Welsh and Scottish people, a kinship of sorts, but I regard you/them as foreign.
The latest data on English identity is available on the ippr website.
http://www.ippr.org.uk/publicationsandreports/publication.asp?id=730
Thanks Toque. I fear that the point I was trying to make didn’t resonate with you at all. So let me try to tease out an answer another way. Just out of interest.
I accept the point that we have to be officially British, at least for now. But in the future, when England is independent, could you ever think of yourself as British in a non-national sense? Or would it make you wince a little if people thought of you and a Scotsman as both British, even though both countries were independent and they were clearly not talking about your nationality?
If the “Scandinavian” example doesn’t work, try the same thing with “Caribbean”. Many Caribbean countries have a lot in common in terms of their culture and history, to the extent that people call themselves Caribbean and don’t mind being thought of as Caribbean. But I can’t imagine anyone would describe their nationality as Caribbean.
Why does seemingly every debate on this site eventually turn into the same dozen people arguing about who is Welsh and who is not?
That’s rather unkind, Gethin. This has been a good debate that has spent quite a long time on Englishness.
MH,
When I lived in Canada and Germany people often called me British. It didn’t bother me because when Germans and Canadians refer to me as British they’re not making a political point, which is what David was doing when he wrote “British = English”.
Funnily enough I was never called British when I lived in Scotland. Any English person who thinks that their primary identity is British needs to go and live in Scotland, or Wales. What knows he of England who only England knows?
I would say that the cultural sense of ‘British’ that MH was referring to is the most valid way in which the term can be used – more so than the ethnic-racial or national-citizenship meanings – and that I would recognise such a usage and description of myself (speaking as an Englishman) after any putative separation of the three (or four, including Cornwall) nations of Great Britain into self-governing entities or states. There definitely is such a thing as a British culture, over and above the officially sponsored culture a la BBC: mentalities, behaviours, reflexes and social conventions that we hold largely in common as people who have lived together and inter-married over centuries.
I have huge difficulties with the 2001 and proposed 2011 Censuses for the way they use ‘British’, ‘English’ and ‘Welsh’ in relation to national identity and ‘ethnic group’. Unlike Toque, for instance, I probably won’t write ‘other’ and write in ‘White – English’ as my ‘ethnic group’ in the 2011 Census, as this frames ethnicity in purely racial terms and sets up a white-English racial category, which I don’t accept. It should be said that Welsh people are in exactly the same conundrum, as the English Census is exactly the same as the Welsh one, with the exception that ‘Welsh’ comes before ‘English’ in the list of possible national identities and all the questions are also available in Welsh. I’ll probably select ‘white – other’ and then write in ‘white’ again, based on interpreting the question as being primarily about race and refusing ‘English’ as a (white only) racial category.
Interestingly, similar reservations might apply to anyone who felt their national identity / ethnicity were mainly ‘British’ rather than ‘English’ or ‘Welsh’. That is, the Census form also makes ‘British’ a white-racial identity alongside a national identity. If, on the other hand, it correctly differentiated between race (e.g. ‘white / European / Caucasian’) and ethnic identity (in the sense of culture and family background), then I’d select ‘white’ as race, ‘English’ and ‘British’ as ethnic identity, and ‘English’ as national identity, which I think would present a far more accurate and detailed picture of these overlapping identities than the form in its present manifestation allows.
Apparently, though, if the Tories win the election, they’re thinking of re-designing the form, and the ethnic question might disappear anyway!
Britologywatch,
I don’t write in “White English” I just write “English”.
I hold a UK passport so that’s the extent of my Britishness determined. For any identity question I am English.
Toque: “Interesting. Do you differentiate between national identity and ethnic identity? “
The Office of National Statistics was measuring self identification in terms of national identity. I incorrectly wrote of ‘ethnic’ identity when I meant ‘national’ identity, understanding that the two could simultaneously mean the same thing and opposite depending on context. My apologies for any misstatement on my part regarding the clear intent of the ONS. From what I can discern, the ONS was not measuring any sense of “belonging”, as you state the Dept of Justice survey was measuring.
Reviewing the ONS article, it is clear that place of birth is more important in determining national self identification then an individual’s ethnic extraction. Thus, one could say that someone like Joe Calzaghe might feel more Welsh because he was born in Wales, whatever his ethnic heritage. I do not mean to suggest that the Italian Dragon self-identifies one way or another on the issue. The ONS differentiated between those that felt Welsh and Other (7%, with the “Other” most often attributed as “British”) and those that felt of Welsh nationality (60% of all Wales residents, 87% of Wales-born residents).
This sense of Civic Nationalism is what John Dixon had written about in his introduction to WalesHome. This sense of civic nationalism is firmly rooted in Plaid, and hearkens back to influential author Dr DJ Davies and Gwnfor Evans.
Toque: “do you see it as your job to deprive those Welsh people who do feel British of that dual identity?”
Not at all, I believe it is perfectly reasonable and natural for some people to be both Welsh and British, and I do not wish to place a wedge between those two identities. The two identities are not mutually exclusive in any sense. As MH makes note, one could define “British” as simply a resident on the isle of Britain sharing an affinity with the other nations of the island. While Hendre is also quite right to note the original Britons were in fact Welsh.
Adam Higgitt: “[This], of course, is “the plan” of a number of the self-styled Celts.”
Celts were themselves multi-ethnic peoples from Iberia to the British and Irish Isles to Germany and further abroad, and all sharing a linguistic family and cultural tradition. Celt is shorthand for describing linguistic and cultural patters which transcend ethnicity. Today’s Celts are, like they always have been, 1) those that speak a Celtic language, 2) self-identify with a sense of “Celtic culture”. If one considers DNA, then the peoples of Wales and Ireland are more closely related to the Basques, and so too but to a lesser degree are the residents in England, at least according to Stephen Oppenheime in Origins of the British (pgs 375-378). And this is not surprising, as there has long been known of a thriving trade route from Galicia to Brittany, Cornwall, Wales, and Ireland.
Toque: “political point, which is what David was doing when he wrote “British = English”.
The only political point inherit with my statement is that British “pop” culture is inherently Anglo-Centric. This, as CapM made note above, was a simply a rebranding of “English”, and occurred after the Acts of Union between England and Scotland. Today, British “pop” culture predominates because it caters to the largest populated nation in Britain. Again, there is nothing insidious about this, and as I stated above I am an Anglophile, a lover of England and things English.
However, I realise that this Anglo-centricity, this Britishness, has resulted in siphoning off Welsh cultural endeavors, most evident in the decline of the Welsh language but also in other aspects of Welsh culture too. Welsh culture, which should be noted, successfully withstood pressures of “British conformity” well until the advent of broadcasting. As Dr Davies wrote, prior to the late 19th century the Welsh were able to fully incorporate newcomers into Welsh society, and Welsh remained the majority language for most of Wales well until the mid 19th century. There were so many Welsh publications in the late 1800s, (with a significant amount published in America!) as to make you spellbound in wonderment.
A three pronged perfect storm changed this. First was the “Welsh Not” policy from the 1840s onward which forbade the speaking of Welsh in classrooms across Wales, clearly with English as the only approved medium for instruction. Generations of Welsh learned to read and write their own language only through chapel. Second, the huge influx of immigrants into South Welsh coalfields, so many within such as short time that assimilation would prove challenging even in the best of times. But why should these new residents learn the language of their neighbors when the Welsh language wasn’t even taught in school or approved in official government business? Lastly, broadcasting. Initially, radio broadcasts from England were the only broadcasts to be heard until stations were established in Cardiff and other locations, and these stations offered some broadcasting in Welsh. However, according to Professor John Davies, residents in England complained about hearing Welsh on the radio and successfully petitioned to have all Welsh language broadcasts stopped. For a good while, the only broadcast heard in Welsh was a station in Ireland, which offered a show or two in Welsh.
Plaid successfully campaigned for Welsh language radio broadcasts in the 1930s, but by the 1950s the BBC continued its policy of ignoring the Welsh language. And in the face of such influential centralized programming from London, Anglo-centric “Britishness” eroded the use of the Welsh language at home and eventually in the chapel too.
While I personally hold no grudges towards British “pop” culture, or any sense of “British” identity, I know that the origin of such identity is firmly Anglo-Centric and I simply wish a more even playing field for the residents of Wales.
David
I wasn’t passing comment on the origins or veracity of the Celts or Celtic self-identification. I was using the same phrase as the person I was quoting to point out that the sense of alienation he expressed was exactly what a number of Welsh and Scottish nationalists intended him to feel.
Do they though? I too have no real gripes against the English people, just the English state and institutions that have, let’s face it, treated the English (at times) as bad as they’ve treated the Welsh, Irish and Scots. My nationalism, civic and cultural, isn’t a slap in the face for England, it’s just being proud of who we are, standing on the mountaintops and shouting it! (something that is long overdue this side of Offas). And with all sincerity I wish the same for the Irish, the Scots AND the English. Because by keeping up this “Great British” pretence, all we are doing is homogenising our four counties and cultures – and we will be all the poorer for that., because we’ve got so much more to offer than that.
England is a great country, full of great figures, art, music, literature, inventions. Why can’t they stand up and celebrate that? The Welsh and Scots are
Al
I’m sure you are sincere in what you say (though I’m also sure there are some nationalists who, for want of a better phrase, hate the English). But your project depends not just on the Welsh feeling different from the English, but also vice versa. You believe in a Welsh distinctiveness, rooted in culture, history, language – and possibly outlook and sentiment, too – such that it demands and deserves separate political institutions. I appreciate that it is inclusive in the sense that it is not rooted in ethnicity, but self-identification. But it is a philosophy that places a lot of emphasis on exclusivity. I don’t see how it could be otherwise
Hmm yeah, but isn’t that the same as being English? British? European? By the same reasoning, identifying with any of those is exclusive by its very nature. But, like a lot of things, it’s only wrong when the Welsh do it.
Al – you said it was wrong. I didn’t. I merely said that it needs the kind of response we got earlier in this thread (and which you endorsed):
“I was once English and British. Now I’m English and never British.”
My comment about the Welsh being ‘the only Brits on the island’ was tongue in cheek. However as we self-identified as ‘British’ before the foundation of the British state, unlike the Irish, Scots and English. we have never felt any particular tension between our foundation mythology/early history and the tag of Britishness. Having said that, I suspect that Welsh Britishness is still more likely to be tied up with two world wars and a national health service. And Gwyn Alf would still be exasperated with us!