ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the construction of national and other identities of place in the informal atmosphere of people’s leisure time. It might be suggested that people have been more free to choose their identities when they have not been constrained by work, paid or unpaid, or membership of formal and involuntary associations, such as school, the armed forces, or even families. How people chose to identify themselves during their spare time might be expected to provide a good indicator of categories of collective distinctiveness. The range of spare time activities that could have been discussed is enormous. Cinema, fashion, eating habits or music might all have provided the focus for discussion.1
This chapter will examine three main themes: sport, holidays and fears about the Americanisation of youth culture. Spectator sports have had a central place in popular culture since the late nineteenth century. They have reinforced overarching national identities, but have also encouraged division through support for the individual nations of the United Kingdom. A different focus will be upon the British on holiday – both at home and abroad. Holidays and day trips have often been used to explore the ‘real’ rural Britain, but seaside resorts have also been areas where many of the rules of ‘national character’ no longer apply. A discussion of the British abroad in the late twentieth century will examine representations of the ‘English’ and their attempts to live up to them in their direct encounters with the foreign ‘other’. Finally the chapter will discuss ongoing anxieties over the future of British culture in the face of the influence of American cultural forms among young Britons.
