Englishness: The Political Force Transforming Britain
Englishness: The Political Force Transforming Britain
The Stevenson Trust for Citizenship
Date: Tuesday 20 April 2021
Time: 18:00 - 19:30
Venue: Zoom Webinar
Category: Public lectures
Speaker: Professor Richard Wyn Jones of Cardiff University
Until the Brexit referendum, there was widespread doubt as to whether politicised English nationalism existed at all, at least beyond a small fringe. Since then, it has come to be regarded an obvious explanation for the vote to Leave the European Union. Subsequent opinion polls have raised doubts about the extent of continuing English commitment to the Union of the United Kingdom itself. Yet even as Englishness is apparently reshaping Britain's place in world and perhaps, ultimately, the state itself, it remains poorly understood.
Join the Stevenson Trust for a lecture by Professor Richard Wyn Jones as he draws on data from the Future of England Survey and analysis from his new book, co-authored with Professor Ailsa Henderson of the University of Edinburgh, to make new and original arguments about the nature of English nationalism. In their pathbreaking research they demonstrate that English nationalism is emphatically not a rejection of Britain and Britishness. Rather, English nationalism combines a sense of grievance about England's place within the United Kingdom with a fierce commitment to a particular vision of Britain's past, present, and future. Understanding its Janus-faced nature - both England and Britain - is key not only to understanding English nationalism, but also to understanding the ways in which it is transforming politics across Britain, including in Scotland and Wales.