Who buys them then? Are you seriously telling me non-Brits are buying British flags just for the hell of it? Or maybe Brits buy the flags and only display them in their linen closets.
Yes non-brits; both tourists in the UK and internationally. The 2012 olympics helped to make the union flag cool.
And certain events, like the Proms and international sporting events.
Of course, it’s probably an exaggeration to say nobody displays the union flag day-to-day in their home or office…there must be some people who do. But, I lived my first 33 years in the UK, and I don’t recall ever seeing the flag displayed that way.
Yes, you’re more likely to see it as a cool graphic on a cushion than as a display of patriotism. I rented a holiday hime in France last year that had one as a rug in the living room (French owners, for the record. I don’t think they were anglophiles).
The title did raise my eyebrows, since generic American is an ethnicity itself, and also has several subtypes. But after reading your post I understand the question.
I don’t have a good answer myself, being another generic Brit, but your suggestions reminded me I know a Chilean who has British ancestry and went to a British school in Chile to learn English, his wife is French Chilean and similarly went to a French school, and their kids speak all three languages. They seem to follow more of her French cultural traditions in cooking. I get the impression these foreign-language based schools are a lot more common in Latin America and would be frowned up on in the US.
Also, no one eats bangers and mash for breakfast, lol.
My then employer bought all the employees UK flags for our desks during the Queen’s diamond jubilee, so that’s one explanation. Afterwards I wanted to keep mine up but didn’t want anyone to think I was a UKIP supporter, so I ordered an EU flag online to display with it. Of course, that all went to pot later…
There are also a couple of houses in my area that have flagpoles outside and variously display British or English flags, and in one case Ukrainian, so it’s not totally unknown. They probably are UKIP supporters (except the Ukrainians).
That’s the thing, isn’t it? If you display a Union Jack for anything other than some royal event or international sports competition, everyone will think you’re a fascist.
I’m adopted, so none of the above.
According to my Ancestry.com genetic test, I’m a little bit of pretty much everything.
I guess growing up more closely with my mother’s Czech/Polish heritage being at the forefront, I understand that history/participate more in continuing their traditions.
However, If I had $1 for every polka danced at a wedding from someone on my dad’s side, I’d be rich as all get out. An uncle and cousin returned recently from visiting the original home in Germany, so it has sparked an interest in learning about where the family is from.
I can’t do that with my mom’s side, as everything was decimated in WWII.
(There seems to be a weird commonality amongst many adopted people I know - we’re very interested in the family trees of our not-related-by-blood families. I still spend time researching the family tree)
UKIP supporters aren’t necessarily fascists (or at least they weren’t before Farage quit and the party degenerated from proto-racism to actual racism), but I’ve also seen a few houses round here with BNP posters in their windows in the past. It’s that kind of area.
It’s a shame, cause I do think the union jack is a pretty cool flag, much better than the England one that appears during world cup season.
I am Swedish on my mother’s side and Scottish/Irish/English on my father’s side. However, our family doesn’t do anything particularly ‘ethnic’. My maternal grandfather was from Sweden but my Scottish/Irish/English ancestors are like 5 or 6 generations ago. They had originally settled in the US (it appears one line came over to North America on the Mayflower). A few lines were “United Empire Loyalists” who were colonists who fought on the British side during the US revolutionary war and eventually moved to New Brunswick.
Tossing in another datum: up until the age of 30 or so, if asked about my ancestry, I would have said German. My father had a typical German name, so was my mother’s maiden name. So was her mother’s maiden name, and my father’s mother maiden name. Germans everywhere you looked. But none of them spoke a word of German so far as I knew, and none of them cooked anything particularly german outside the occasional sausage.
And I knew absolutely nothing in more detail: no idea what towns any of the ancestors might have come from (well, it’s been at least five generations) or what areas of Germany – for that matter, I’m not sure what ‘areas’ Germans would break their country down into, I mean, the equivalent of America’s ‘The South’ or ‘New England’ or whatever.
Basically, I have zero feeling of any attachment to a German ‘heritage.’
And then, around 30, I happened to learn that my father was actually the son of his mother’s first marriage, to someone with a typical English name, and though he’d grown up using her second husband’s name, he’d never been officially adopted.
So… now I can legitimately feel absolutely no attachment to an English heritage, too? Hey, at least I speak English…
“Unless…
I think of “British” as a nationality, not an ethnicity. Not sure how things work over the pond, but are you English, Scotch, Welsh, Northern Irish, an Anglo or Saxon, an Anglo Saxon, Norman? I know you said you are “white”, but what of British citizens of Pakistani origin?”
My take is that the Welsh, Northern Irish and Scots identify as such, English people such as myself describe themselves as such to foreigners, but overall feel British, especially as that is what is written in the passport. The views of the other three groups depends hugely on whether or not they are passionate nationalists. My impression, which may be a little out of date as I have been an expat for 40 years, is that blacks tend to describe themselves as Jamaican for the first generation, Asians likewise according to their country of origin, but in each case it gets more complicated with the generations born in the UK who are essentially regarded as British but of a different color. Except by the usual bigots and racists, who sound off about blacks and Pakis. I saw somewhere that the Chinese get the brunt of the racism and are still regarded as Chinese even after x generations.
While I lived in japan, I never met any Caucasians who identified as Japanese, regardless of residence status and length. Not least because the Japanese never regard any foreigners as Japanese; people of Korean origin who have been in Japan for several generations are still discriminated against.
But, as you say, it is essentially an American question. My father did some research into the genealogy of the family (nothing at all exciting), but in general people in Europe are not much concerned.
Ethnicity and race are also irrevocably intertwined — not only because someone’s ascribed race can be part of their chosen ethnicity but also because of other social factors. “If you have a minority position [in society], more often than not, you’re racialized before you’re allowed access to your ethnic identity,” Ifekwunigwe said. “That’s what happens when a lot of African immigrants come to the United States and suddenly realize that while in their home countries, they were Senegalese or Kenyan or Nigerian, they come to the U.S. — and they’re black.” Even with a chosen ethnicity, “race is always lurking in the background,” she said.
replace Senegalese, Kenyan or Nigerian with Pole, Lithuanian, or Croatian.
My mom’s parents were both immigrants from Hungary (separately). My grandfather came though Ellis Island! I didn’t know much about my dad’s ancestry, other than that he identified as “mostly” Scottish, When I was in Cornwall about twenty years ago, the publican asked if my friend and I were “Cousin Jacks.” My friend had a German background, but I said I was “mostly Scottish” on my dad’s side. He said I could be an honorary Cousin Jack. Then, I did a dna test recently and found I was 5% Cornish! I’m a real Cousin Jack, no longer a pretender.
My dad’s family was all in Northern America by 1840 or so, and the majority came over in the 17th or 18th century. There were basically no specifically “ethnic” habits or foods that were passed down from that side. My mom left home and moved 2000 miles away from her family in her 20s. She didn’t keep much that she learned from her parents with her. She lost most of her Hungarian so she couldn’t pass it down to us. I only got Hungarian food when we went to visit her family – which was only three times in my life.
While I have no particular affinity for my Irish-German heritage. My brother-in-law is a Scottish-American. He learned to play the bagpipes, marches in parades in a kilt, took the family to Scotland.
[quote=“carrps, post:115, topic:916086, full:true”]
My mom’s parents were both immigrants from Hungary (separately). My grandfather came though Ellis Island! I didn’t know much about my dad’s ancestry, other than that he identified as “mostly” Scottish, When I was in Cornwall about twenty years ago, the publican asked if my friend and I were “Cousin Jacks.” My friend had a German background, but I said I was “mostly Scottish” on my dad’s side. He said I could be an honorary Cousin Jack. Then, I did a dna test recently and found I was 5% Cornish! I’m a real Cousin Jack, no longer a pretender.
My dad’s family was all in Northern America by 1840 or so, and the majority came over in the 17th or 18th century. There were basically no specifically “ethnic” habits or foods that were passed down from that side. My mom left home and moved 2000 miles away from her family in her 20s. She didn’t keep much that she learned from her parents with her. She lost most of her Hungarian so she couldn’t pass it down to us. I only got Hungarian food when we went to visit her family – which was only three times in my life.
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Thanks all for answering my question in the spirit in which it was intended. I found them all very interesting. Sorry it turned into a debate about what ethnicity was.