British Identity: Dying, not Dead
Cultures have always mixed and clashed, but the United Kingdom has a history of having a unifying identity for its population. It is the British Identity; its conception was designed to unite the countries first on the British Isles, then eventually the citizens of the British Empire. The Empire has long since passed, but is the British Identity still accepted by those living within the United Kingdom? Contemporary literature is challenging that identity, pointing to cultural differences and traditions prevailing over an outdated unifying concept. The purpose of this paper is to examine how the British Identity plays into two contemporary novels Brick Lane, and Sheepshagger. The settings of the stories will be examined in its relation to the British Identity, as well as the characters attitudes towards the concept. The clash of cultures prevalent in the novels will be examined and final thoughts on the future of the British Identity, and whether it is a dying concept as the novels suggest.
The British Identity can be dated to the creation of the Great Britain in 1707. At that time, it referred to the collective identity of the English Scottish and Welsh. The term became more popular during the rise of the Second British Empire. Historian Linda Colley attributes the creation of the British Identity as a way to unify the inhabitants of Great Britain in times of conquest, and expansion of the empire. “Empire did serve as a powerful distraction and cause in common” (Colley, 1992). However with the fall of empire, the British identity is also put into question. The 2011 census revealed that around 20% of the UK population identify themselves as British first. Large proportions of this percentage are n...
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"To prohibit a great people from making all that they can of every part of their own produce advantageous to themselves, is a manifest violation of the most sacred rights of mankind." These views of Adam Smith were very much supported throughout the mid-18th century. Throughout this time, many new developments were made regarding American colonists view's of their sense of identity and unity as Americans. Due to an over controlling British government and a need for individuality as a country, colonists became Americans through their great fight to highly develop their sense of identity and unity as Americans.
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The community, although it is very tight and strongly bound by tradition and family, is also troubled and varied. The potato crop is failing, the maps are being changed for the convenience of the English, people want to move out of Ireland, (for example when Maire tells Hugh she wants to learn English for when she moves to America). Things appear to be at peace when we are put into this environment and everything seems well at first, but as we look further into it we can see things are much more deep seeded and dark than at first glance. For example, Doalty steals a piece of equipment from some English soldiers; this cheeky mischief seems harmless until we hear about some of the English horses being lead off a cliff to their deaths. Nothing is what it seems in this play, there are many more issues that lurk beneath the rather innocent surface of this seemingly simple, rural community; feelings of hatred and betrayal course through the bodies of many of the populous. What the English are doing is not right, nor is it fair. They have no right to change the identity of a people for their own convenience.
The past saw identity boundaries being stringently controlled by hegemonic discourse. Laws and social conventions aimed at controlling the “other” were common place. Racial, ethnic, and religious...
Nineteenth century Britain was a dominate empire across the globe. Despite the country’s loss of a major colonial force — the United States — the country still dominate world trade, allowing for a sense of pride to be installed within the hearts of the English. As exposed throughout Virginia Woolf’s, Mrs. Dalloway, the mindset of the British was one of grand superiority. Due to the success of the British empire's colonial expeditions, many British citizens felt as though their country was the greatest and most advanced in the world, creating a sense of superficial, self-centered, pride, as reflected through the character of Clarissa. This pride, however, had many dangerous side effects later in history. British Imperialism, combined with unnecessary pride, caused many racial issues for England that would be fought over for centuries to come.
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Damrosch, David, et al., ed. The Longman Anthology of British Literature: Vol. B. Compact ed. New York: Longman - Addison Wesley Longman, 2000.
Britain is regarded as one of the most ethically and culturally diverse countries in Europe. According to the 1999 census around 3 million people in the United Kingdom, which equates to 6% of the population, belong to minority ethnic groups (Le Var 1998). The 2001 census suggests that this figure is now around 7.9%, which equates to 4.6 million (Office for National Statistics 2003).
Gerald of Wales’ was most likely never in Ireland, and his writing is not an accurate portrayal of the Irish, but a chance to discuss hybridity and turn his readers against it while also the Irish.
The novel, Small Island, by the contemporary writer, Andrea Levy chronicles the lives of a handful of British individuals in the years following the Second World War. The characters and their interactions make up the entirety of the plot, with their interactions whole-heartedly representing post World War Two cultural and political change. The main characters represent certain aspects of this change that occurred in post-war British society. Hortense Gilbert represents a pretentious, romanticized, fleeting vision of the Empire in which Britain once found much pride. Queenie Bligh is a worldly, open minded woman who foreshadows the politically and socially progressive Britain, which is on the horizon for herself and her contemporaries. Alike, Levy employs her jovial character Joseph Gilbert as a contrast to the qualms and the uneasiness of postwar racial progress possessed by many people at the time in which the novel takes place. Consequently, Gilbert and Michael Roberts symbolize the natural progression of such change, for they are both affirmative characters in Small Island. Lastly, Queenie’s husband, Robert represents the ‘old guard’ of Britain and its deeply rooted sentiments against diversity and similar issues. Small Island provides for an
In British Literature religion plays a role in a vast majority of works. Even if the role is not explosively apparent, there are a generous amount of small inspirations and distortions in the texts. Some texts are theorized to have even been altered from their original state to reflect an amount of religion in them. Other texts are formatted as a result of religious influence. Religion has an elaborate and intricate influence in a variety of ways in many works throughout the development of British Literature.
Let’s face it, in The United States, we do not understand cricket, we do not understand tea, and we certainly do not understand hidden emotions. Of course there is more to Britain than these cultural icons, just like America is not just made of cowboys from “Dallas” and loud egotistic tourists. However in the year 2000, there are still several myths surrounding the British culture that are very much alive today.
The issue of identity is of primary importance in the cosmopolitan today’s world characterized by blending of cultures and globalization processes. Identity is a construct: the ways an individual understands what it is to belong to a certain gender, race or culture. As Jonathan Culler says “Literature has not only made identity a theme; It has played a significant role in the construction of the identity of the readers. Literary works encourage identification with characters by showing things from their point of view” (2005: 112). In this regard there is a lot of theoretical debate that concerns the nature of ‘subject’ or ‘self’. The question about the ‘subject’ is ‘what am I?’ and further the question whether the identity of the ‘subject’ ‘something given’ or ‘something constructed’ has