Britishness and Englishness

In Miseducation and Racism, in the first on-line issue of Ethnicity and Race in a Changing World, Marika Sherwood complains about the lack of government engagement with issues of race and ethnicity, such as in the curriculum, and wonders what the current emphasis on 'Britishness' is all about. Count me in, I too am perplexed.

The political angst, I suppose, is what constitutes Britishness now parliaments are to some extent devolved. What have the English, Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish in common, yet which is different from other countries or regions. There is an organisational response - they have a British passport and thereby British citizenship. But the sense of angst requires more than that, a loyalty, a common heritage, a desire to contribute to the common good. Yet these citizenship ambitions need not be tied to a geographical area. When Britain went into Europe, many people were clear that they did not wish to be corporate Europeans but knew instinctively that they were British. True that was tribal, us against 'them'. Other states in Europe have a semblance of unity; only Britain contains four separate countries. Also, it is a cultural and political hegemony that 'decides' what our common heritage is. Is it how Britain saved and civilized the world? or how Britain exploited and ruined the world? Who are the heroes, who the forgotten? We recognise our heroes by the Order of the British Empire, so to accept you join the imperial club. In Germany between 1930 and 1945, the only heroic action was to be disloyal to the then government. Loyalty does not exclude moral choices.

Even more perplexing is the angst for Englishness. A Welshman or Scot might be born in England without becoming English in the soul. My mother's came from Nottingham, my grandfather a miner from the age of 12. My father's family came from Dublin, and before that from Scotland via Canada, since they were 'cleared' off the land by British 'nobility'. What is the common heritage I should treasure? I have friends whose ancestors in India, Pakistan, the Caribbean, Africa and America were exploited and harried in other ways, who now find themselves in England as part of the melting pot that is named 'English'.

In America, to be American in spite of ethnic and cultural backgrounds, meant something ideologically. To be America was to create and benefit from 'opportunity' (the reality was more restricting). Americans are even now re-evaluating what it means to be American, since the past fifty years have been found wanting.

I therefore contend that seeking out an English, or British, cultural heritage is a red herring, and is potentially divisive and damaging. What we should be doing is following Barack Omama's lead in the USA and take Englishness, and Britishness by the scruff of its neck, shake it up, re-evaluate it, and decide together as a nation of mixed origins and experiences what Britishness ought to be, what ideals we should be promoting, and what prejudices we should be attacking. Then, and only then, will we have something worthy of our loyalty.
See also M. Toolan