Inventing England: English identity and the Scottish ‘other’, 1586–1625

2018 ◽  
pp. 305-326
Author(s):  
Jenna M. Schultz
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Great Britain ◽  
Strong Reaction ◽  
Archaeological Evidence ◽  
Language Studies ◽  
English National Identity ◽  
Identity Based ◽  
Single State ◽  
English Identity ◽  
Historical Accounts

Through dynastic accident, England and Scotland were united under King James VI and I in 1603. To smooth the transition, officials attempted to create a single state: Great Britain. Yet the project had a narrow appeal; the majority of the English populace rejected a closer relationship with Scotland. Such a strong reaction against Scotland resulted in a revived sense of Englishness. This essay analyzes English tactics to distance themselves from the Scots through historical treatises. For centuries, the English had created vivid histories to illuminate their ancient past. It is evident from the historical works written between 1586 and 1625 that authors sought to maintain a position of dominance over Scotland through veiled political commentaries. As such, their accounts propagated an English national identity based on a sense of historical supremacy over the Scottish. This was further supported through the use of language studies and archaeological evidence. After the 1603 Union of the Crowns, these stories did not change. Yet, questions arose regarding the king's genealogy, as he claimed descent from the great kings of both kingdoms. Consequently, historians re-invented the past to merge their historical accounts with the king's ancestral claims while continuing to validate English assertions of suzerainty.

scholarly journals RE-AFFIRMING ENGLISHNESS: ULTIMATE HALF-NESS AND (CRITICAL) MULTICULTURALISM IN BILLY BRAGG’S ENGLAND, HALF ENGLISH

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Liyanti Lisda
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Great Britain ◽  
Northern Ireland ◽  
National Culture ◽  
Critical Multiculturalism ◽  
British Identity ◽  
English Identity

National identity in Great Britain is always interesting to discuss, as it dealt with England, Scotland, Walles, and Northern-Ireland identity, yet it is English identity that overshadowed British Identity. The problematic concept of English identity also brought up by Billy Bragg, a remarkable British musician, in his England, Half English-song in early 2000. This paper scrutinizes the question of “what does half English mean and what should be meant by full English?” using critical views on multiculturalism. The result shows that the basic idea of Bragg's works important in showing how the most changeable and essential signs of national culture and the clearer voices of its immigrant are perfect expressions of the "ultimate" Half-ness of England.

Drinkin’ and Carryin’ On in Search of Community

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jerry T. Watkins
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Gay And Lesbian ◽  
Market Forces ◽  
Friendship Networks ◽  
Race And Class ◽  
Lesbian Community ◽  
Identity Based ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Private Homes ◽  
Gain Access

Before market forces created recognizable sites of gay and lesbian community, some queer Floridians leveraged their race and class privileges to create or gain access to spaces in order to find others like themselves. This chapter uses bars, “gay parties,” and friendship networks to show the ways that postwar mobility shaped queer socializing through complex negotiations of desire and access. In Tallahassee, the Cypress Lounge at the Floridan Hotel became an unofficial gay bar, while Florida’s powerbrokers schmoozed and facilitated connections to national identity-based rights discourses. Others used their private homes to host networks of gay and lesbian friends from around the panhandle. In Pensacola, Trader Jon’s and the Hi-Ho Five O’Clock Club were queered by sexually and gender non-conforming individuals.

Chaadaev, Pëtr Iakovlevich (1794–1856)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrzej Walicki
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Historical Development ◽  
Social Philosophy ◽  
Philosophical Problem ◽  
Russian History ◽  
Human History ◽  
The West ◽  
Strong Reaction ◽  
Western Development ◽  
General Rules

Pëtr Chaadaev was the first Russian thinker for whom his own country became a philosophical problem. His works initiated the powerful Russian tradition of reflecting on Russia’s whence and whither: that is to say, the meaning of Russian history, the character of Russian national identity, and the possible, or necessary, paths of Russian historical development in the future. However, Chaadaev’s answer to these questions was mostly negative: he defined Russia not by what it was, but by what it was not. A paradoxical feature of Chaadaev’s s position was that his general philosophical views did not apply to his native country. He was a convinced Westernizer, identifying Western development with universal human history, but Russia was in his view the opposite of the West, an exception to the general rules. His general social philosophy, deeply influenced by the French theocratic traditionalists, was inherently conservative, stressing the importance of supra-individual unity and of continuous historical traditions; in contrast with this, his philosophy of Russian history defined Russia as a country without unity and without history, thus lacking the basic conditions for a genuine conservatism. This view provoked a strong reaction among Russian Romantic conservatives: they accepted some aspects of Chaadaev’s conservative critique of atomistic individualism but tried to refute his pessimistic view of Russia, by arguing that, in fact, not Russia but the West represented atomistic disintegration and incapacity for organic development.

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