ABSTRACT
THIS IS A BOOK ABOUT contemporary Britain and British people. On the one hand, Britain is a country with defined boundaries, a recognisable landscape, a long and contentious history, and a position in the various international economic, social and political league tables. On the other hand, British people are much harder to describe. To begin with, some British people do not live in Britain. Also, many people living in Britain do not think of themselves as British. Nationality is a matter of allegiance and cultural affiliation. Some people say that your nationality is indicated by where you choose to live or by the team you support at sports events; others say that it is a question of who you would fight for. It has also been argued that nationality is no longer a powerful force in Britain, that it is simply a matter of circumstance and that today it is far less significant than local or global identities: relatives, friends and communities are more important to us, and so is transnational culture, such that notions of national identity are both less persuasive and more contentious than they used to be. Above all, nationality is a question of identity and so is crossed by other kinds of identity such as ethnicity, gender, sexuality, religion, age and occupation.
