ABSTRACT
Is there such a thing as ‘Britishness’? More than ever, being ‘British’ is voluntary, not necessary. What is it? Where can we find it? What part do the media play not merely in representing it but in forging changing national realities? Brexit threw the nature of the nation into disarray. It revealed divisions: metropolitan versus old industrial, the south versus the north, the abandoned towns that used to live off the sea versus cosmopolitan centres. But it did not solve the problem of who and what the nation could be. What, indeed, about ‘Englishness’? If the nature of the union between the different nations that compromise Britain is a problem – then the meaning of the ‘English’ nation is even more perplexing. Even raising the subject seems, in one kind of way, indelicate. Is it somehow offensive to even mention the idea of the nation in which we belong but towards which we have complicated allegiances – or which we may feel barely a part of? Surely we are all global citizens, all have multiple identities, which we shuffle and balance? It is quite acceptable, it seems, to assert and celebrate religious and cultural differences, or ‘being Scottish’ – or any number of the national minorities that so gloriously complicate our communities. In any case, we often like to think of ourselves as rather doughty, beleaguered members of minorities bravely asserting our identity against the nasty (and large) nations, or nasty (and large) majorities. As we are frequently shockingly ignorant of the alternative lives of other people we live in close proximity with, many injustices still occur. But actually, it is quite hard to assert, for example, English working-class identity, without being suspect. Of course, ‘nationalism’ can be a very dangerous force and typically, in harsh economic times, it is an appallingly destructive one. But does that mean we should abandon any sense of a unique national identity? What part do the media play in relating us to a common predicament?
