I believe the cringe is intentional in that scene. S lot of Americans salvaging like that. I remember in my elementary school there was a huge wall display with information about France, Spain, and Britain, only all instances where “Britain” would have been correct said “England” instead. So the map highlighting all of Great Britain was labeled “England.”
If you mean like 40 years ago, that lines up pretty well with my experience. May have improved since then, but I have my doubts. Most Americans could not read a map to find their way out of a paper bag.
No, the current Scottish Parliament doesn’t have the power.
Might I say that Claire Forlani never looked worse than that ad? Her wearing that outfit reminded me of Russell Crowe wearing that fur thing in Gladiator.
Someone asked me earlier in the week, in all seriousness, why I refer to myself as British.
I informed her that it is because that is what it says on my passport. I’ve had explain on many a occasion as well that I am not a “British Subject”.
But you realize that’s not a full answer, right? The expectation is that British citizens identify as English, Scottish, or Welsh. If you don’t, then simply referring to your passport doesn’t explain the situation. I would suspect that those who identify as British are likely to be from Northern Ireland.
I think you’re right - the full line is “We were married in castle in Scotland… It’s in England… You know…Paris.”
IIRC the animated end titles also play on this.
But there are British subjects. Up until 1949, that was pretty much everybody born within the areas of British dominion or allegiance was a British subject. In 1949, all those people who were British subjects because of heir birth within the Uk or the Crown colonies became a citizen of the United Kingdom (or of the Crown colonies) but also retained the status of British subject, which they continued to share with the Commonwealth countries’ citizens.
The term “British subject” didn’t get eliminated until 1982, and even then it’s not completely dead: a person born in Ireland before 1949 is still a British subject. In fact, you could be simultaneously a British citizen and a British subject if you were born in Dublin in 1948 and were subsequently naturalized a British citizen.
Nope, people describe themselves however they like, and I, for one, describe myself as both British and English, depending on circumstance. I regard English as my ethnicity and British as my nationality, and it’s fine to be proud of both.
My welsh partner describes it thus: ‘I am proud to be British and privileged to be Welsh’.
Of course there’s also plenty of people who don’t use or like British. Presumably they will be the ones voting for Scottish independence. On the flip side, I have also heard some people from minority immigrant groups say they prefer ‘British’ as they don’t identify with being ‘English’, which they see as an ethnic group they don’t belong to. Then some people prefer ‘British’ because they have mixed English/Scottish/Welsh/N Irish heritage. And some people just prefer it, as a uniting moniker. I would assume amanset falls into this camp.
Only if you made a claim for that status. The relevant bit of law:
Which still doesn’t refute amanset’s point that he (she?) isn’t a British Subject.
But when someone asks “why,” that implies they don’t have all this information. Saying “that’s what it says on my passport” is basically refusing to answer the question.
Presumably it’s because he is British and is annoyed at the expectation that he should identify as English or whatever. What else should he say? ‘It’s on my passport’ is just the same as saying ‘it’s my nationality’. You wouldn’t put the same question to someone who described themselves as Scottish.
I would find the question annoying too, as it implies my nationality doesn’t mean something.
Right, I have only now watched the ad.
Considering it’s an ad purely for the US market, it doesn’t seem that odd a choice at all. As someone who has worked in advertising, I can imagine the conversation thus:
"We need someone really smoking hot for this part. What about that woman from CSI? Claire Forlani, she’s British’
“English, she’s not Scottish.”
“What’s the difference? Anyway, she’s an actress, she can fake it, and she’s married to a Scot so she’ll know how to do it. Anyway, our target audience wouldn’t know the difference.”
Yes, I know, but they used to hate anyone calling them British, because to foreigners British and English are the same thing and the Scots do hate them Englishers.
~(‘.’)~
Given the discussion, I took his/her point to be not that he isn’t, but that there was no such thing.
Or was it because they’re trying to blame all the crimes of the British empire on the English?
I’d appreciate it if you don’t make blanket generalisations like “the Scots do hate them Englishers”. It makes us look like a load of racist pricks. if you’re as Irish as your name suggests you’ll know that the reality is much more nuanced (and hopefully less racist).
Yep; all that makes sense from a marketing perspective - still seems a bit off to market a heavily Scottish vibe with a non-Scot, but yeah, it’s only for us Americans ;).
And yeah, my OP was NOT looking to stir up tensions. It’s just a silly commercial with a hot non-Scot.
Close enough.
I was once reading a book about famous Scots and I was surprised to see Guglielmo Marconi included. Marconi was of partly Scottish ancestry but I thinks it’s quite a stretch to call him a Scot.
He’s German. The Stuart claimant Franz Bonaventura Adalbert Maria Herzog von Bayern, His Royal Highness The Duke of Bavaria. He’s theoretically the King of Bavaria, England, France, Ireland, and Scotland.