Indifference towards national identity: what young adults think about being English and British*

ABSTRACT. National identity should be sharply distinguished from nationalism. People speak by reference to a general and assumed membership of a country, and routine markers of behaviour and style may exhibit this sense of membership. This matter‐of‐fact acceptance of ‘national’ membership does not guarantee enthusiasm for the ‘nation’ and it cannot be taken as a signal of nationalism, banal or otherwise. While theoretical statements and assumptions often suggest that national identity is fundamental to individuals in contemporary societies, empirical investigation of people talking about national identity uncovers some broad strands of indifference and hostility towards national identity in general, and towards British and English identities in particular. This may reflect young adults' wish not to appear ‘nationalist’ just as many would wish not to appear racist. But the level of apathy and antagonism towards national identity among young adults suggests that we ought to reconsider any assumption that national identity is ‘normally’ a powerful and important marker, embraced with enthusiasm.     

Raising the dead: war,memory and American national identity*

Abstract. The dead, particularly the war dead, play a central role in the development of nationalism, nowhere more so than in America. America's mid‐nineteenth century Civil War produced a recognisable and influential ‘cult of the dead’, comparable in its construction with similar developments in Europe following World War I. Focused on the figure of the fallen soldier, especially the volunteer soldier, this cult found physical expression in the development of national cemeteries devoted not just to the burial of those who fell in the war but to the idea of America as a nation, in the development of monuments to the dead that, again, reinforced the new national symbolism of the war era, and in the beginnings of Memorial Day, an American sacred ceremony with clear parallels with the later Armistice Day ceremonies in Europe. In all these developments, America preceded the European nations by several decades, making America a valuable case study for the role that the cult of the fallen soldier plays in national development more generally.     

Devolution and national identity: the rules of English (dis)engagement

ABSTRACT. In this article I consider why the expected English backlash to the asymmetric UK devolution settlement has not yet materialised. Using a corpus of conversational interviews, I discuss the various ways in which people in England currently understand the relationship between national identity and political entitlement. I conclude that English political quiescence, far from constituting an enigma, is comprehensible in the light of the fact that members of the general public do not usually base their assessments of political legitimacy on calculations of English national self‐interest defined in contrast to Scotland. Rather, political issues tend to be judged with reference to principles of equity and procedural justice. English identity is rarely considered legitimate grounds for political voice. Rather, people are inclined to demonstrate a concern to balance the recognition of Scottish rights to national self‐determination, with a display of public reason, civility and civic responsibility understood to be normatively incumbent upon the English majority.     

Reading between the lines: national identity and attitudes to the media in Scotland*

ABSTRACT. The relationship between national identity and how people perceive and consume media is a central but largely untested assumption of studies of nationalism. Using a previously developed classification of identity among English migrants to Scotland, this paper explores associations between how people use the media and how they make sense of their national identity. Compared with Scottish nationals, who tend to adopt a more taken‐for‐granted and uncontentious view of the media, except when they feel that the media presented to them challenge their sense of identity, English migrants find that the agendas of the media in Scotland differ from those they are used to south of the border. Specifically, how they view the media tends to vary according to whether they view themselves as ‘English’, ‘British’ or as ‘becoming Scottish’.     

Boundary mechanisms and symbolic resources: towards a process‐oriented approach to national identity*

This article argues that the classical distinction between civic and ethnic forms of national identity has proved too schematic to come to terms with the dynamic nature of social and political processes. This has caused difficulties particularly for those historians and social scientists studying particular national movements rather than concentrating on a handful of thinkers and intellectuals or taking a broadly comparative approach. As an alternative to the classical model, I propose to distinguish between, on the one hand, the mechanisms which social actors use as they reconstruct the boundaries of national identity at a particular point in time; and, on the other, the symbolic resources upon which they draw when they reconstruct these boundaries.     

Making time for national identity: theoretical concept and empirical glance on the temporal performance of national identity

Despite global, economic, technological and social transformations, nationality has remained an influential identity category. It still forms the basis for collective self‐determination, political sovereignty and sense of belonging. This article puts forward the concept of ‘Chrono‐Work’ to offer a critical approach to national identity. Employing temporal and performative perspectives, the concept addresses the conditions for establishing and constructing national identity. Drawing on Judith Butler's performance theory, it is suggested that performance of national acts loads national identity with meaning through the construction of a chronological narrative. To complete the theoretical picture, a case study of ‘Chrono‐Work’ among the Jewish settlers on the Golan Heights in Israel is offered. It is shown that national identity is constantly performed through temporal strategies that aim at achieving a chronological order. Therefore, it is suggested that national identity is not given, but rather is the result of continuous ‘Chrono‐Work’.     

Episteme,nation‐builders and national identity: the re‐construction of Irishness*

Abstract. There are many disagreements among the three main paradigms of the nationalism literature. Yet most modernists, ethno‐symbolists and constructivists agree that elites play a key role in inventing and re‐inventing nations. Notwithstanding this insight, none of these schools of thought has generated a compelling answer to the question of why the inventors of a certain nation build, out of an infinite number of possibilities, a particular nationness. Analysing the case of twentieth century Irish identity, this article seeks to shed light on this question by inquiring into the process through which elites come to imagine the nation that they seek to build. I argue that epistemic understandings of the world delineate which kinds of national identity are conceivable for, and plausible to, nation‐building elites.     

‘Set in the silver sea’: English national identity and European integration

ABSTRACT. Although many short‐term reasons for a specifically English Euro‐scepticism have been proposed, a long‐term perspective is required to provide a fuller and more rounded treatment of this important and topical political issue. It needs to be grasped in terms of cultural, political and religious factors in English history, specifically, the antiquity and political character of a sense of English national identity, on the one hand, and on the other hand, the nature and impact of Protestant covenantalism. Among the factors that have shaped a sense of English national identity are its insular, geopolitical situation, the early development of a centralised English state, and the concomitant growth of a unified English legal system. To the existing sense of national identity under the Tudors was added a strong current of religious separatism, manifested first through Henry VIII's break with Rome and his vindication of monarchical supremacy in a national church, and second through the Puritan return to the idea of election modelled on the Old Testament narrative of the Exodus and Covenant of the Israelites. These currents have lent to the sense of English national identity a strong oppositional character, in contrast to the transterritorialism of Christendom characteristic of the leading Roman Catholic powers. This can be seen both by comparing English with French historical trajectories, and more recently, in terms of the separate, but allied, position of England in relation to European integration.     

Reconsidering otherness: constructing Estonian identity*

ABSTRACT. The concept of the Other is increasingly popular in nationalism and ethnicity literature, which usually proposes the existence of one significant Other for any national Self, and that this Other is usually threatening and negative. This approach is one‐sided and in need of revision. I suggest that any nation may have many simultaneously existing Others, and more importantly, these Others need not be negative – they may also be positive. By exploring how (1) ‘the Other’ matters in identity construction; (2) there can be several Others at any one time; (3) the Other can be positive as well as negative; (4) the role of any given Other can change during various phases of national identity construction and maintenance; and (5) the particular ‘otherness’ of the Other has social and political consequences, this article will reconsider the role of otherness in the construction, transformation and maintenance of Estonian national identity.     

The chimera of national identity

ABSTRACT. In both popular discourse and many academic works, the existence of national identity is largely taken as given. Although researchers disagree on whether national identities are modern or perennial, and how best to gauge the intensity of identification with a particular nation, there is near unanimity on the view that national identities are real and perceptible entities. In contrast to this view I argue not only that there was no national identity before modernity but also that there is little empirical evidence for the existence of national identities in the modern age either. While it is obvious that many individuals show great affinity for their nations and often express sincere devotion to the ‘national cause’, none of these are reliable indicators of the existence of a durable, continuous, stable and monolithic entity called ‘national identity’. To fully understand the character of popular mobilisation in modernity it is paramount to refocus our attention from the slippery and non‐analytical idiom of ‘identity’ towards well‐established sociological concepts such as ‘ideology’ and ‘solidarity’. In particular, the central object of this research becomes the processes through which large‐scale social organisations successfully transform earnest micro‐solidarity into an all‐encompassing nationalist ideology.     

Everyday nationalism and international hockey: contesting Canadian national identity

This paper examines how hockey is used to construct and demarcate the Canadian national community from external others, namely, the USA, Europe and Russia/USSR. The paper suggests popular nationalist narratives around the sport of hockey construct difference from external others in ways that place them in tension with state and corporate interests. Drawing on the concept of everyday nationalism, this article explores how the interplay between international competition, national identity and commercial sport has made hockey an ambiguous and contested national symbol in Canada.     

Heritage and national identity: Exploring the relationship in Romania

Abstract

Within heritage studies the relationship between national heritage and national identity is frequently taken as axiomatic. The construction of a national heritage is an important part of nation‐building, and historic buildings and monuments can be powerful symbols of a nation's aspirations and identity. Yet this relationship has received relatively little empirical investigation. This paper reports an exploratory study of the heritage/national identity relationship in Romania which focuses on just one Roman monument – Trajan's bridge. For many Romanians the monument is a powerful symbol of their identity representing Dacian and Roman origins, Latinity, and the continuity of Romanian settlement in Transylvania. The monument was also seen by some as an important symbol of Romania's attempt to construct a post‐Communist identity, and to forge closer links with western Europe. However, the meanings of the monument are not shared by all Romanians, and in particular are strongly contested by Romania's Hungarian minority.     

Place, national identity and post-socialist transformations: an introduction

This paper serves as an introduction to this theme issue on the topic of post-socialist identity politics surrounding nation building, national identity and nationalism. It presents an overview of the key processes of post-socialist identity formation in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and the former Soviet Union (FSU) in order to contextualise this collection of papers. This introduction outlines the key processes of identity formation and the treatment of nationalism under conditions of state-socialism, and then identifies the main processes of identity formation which have emerged in discourses surrounding nations and nationalities in post-socialist CEE and the FSU. A short account of each of the papers in the theme issue is then presented to identify the common strands of their analyses of post-socialist nationalisms.     

Race,culture, and national identity

Wade, Peter. Blackness and Race Mixture: The Dynamics of Racial Identity in Colombia. Baltimore, MD; Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993. xv + 415 pp. including appendices, references, and index. $58.00 cloth.

Wetherell, Margaret and Jonathan Potter. Mapping the Language of Racism: Discourse and the Legitimation of Exploitation. New York: Columbia University Press, 1992. ix + 246 pp. including appendices, references, and index. $45.00 cloth, $15.00 paper.