British Historians And National Identity

Two eminent scholars of historiography examine the concept of national identity through the key multi-volume histories of the last two hundred years. Starting with Hume’s History of England (1754–62), they explore the work of British historians whose work had a popular readership and an influence on succeeding generations of British children.

Why is English national identity so enigmatic and so elusive? Why, unlike the Scots, Welsh, Irish and most of continental Europe, do the English find it so difficult to say who they are? The Making of English National Identity, first published in 2003, is a fascinating exploration of Englishness and what it means to be English. Drawing on historical, sociological and literary theory, Krishan Kumar examines the rise of English nationalism and issues of race and ethnicity from earliest times to the present day. He argues that the long history of the English as an imperial people has, as with other imperial people like the Russians and the Austrians, developed a sense of missionary nationalism which in the interests of unity and empire has necessitated the repression of ordinary expressions of nationalism. Professor Kumar's lively and provocative approach challenges readers to reconsider their pre-conceptions about national identity and who the English really are.

This book is the first study of how the BBC, through radio, tried to represent what it meant to be British. The book combines an examination of the BBC's desire to construct a strong, unitary sense of Britishness (through empire and the monarchy) with a thorough consideration of the broadcasting in the non-English parts of the United Kingdom.

Two eminent scholars of historiography examine the concept of national identity through the key multi-volume histories of the last two hundred years. Starting with Hume’s History of England (1754–62), they explore the work of British historians whose work had a popular readership and an influence on succeeding generations of British children.

This is an interpretative study of the idea of Britain, examining the transformation of a sectarian concept into an imperial ideology forged during a period of sustained warfare in Europe and ever-expanding areas beyond Europe during the second half of the Eighteenth century. It seeks to examine constitutional history from a non-Anglocentric perspective and to relocate it to historiographical developments in Social History and the History of Ideas. Based on more than 25 years of research, it seeks to examine critically a concept which increasingly has come under public debate during the past decade.

Canada and the British World surveys Canada's national history through a British lens. In a series of essays focusing on the social, cultural, and intellectual aspects of Canadian identity over more than a century, the complex and evolving relationship between Canada and the larger British World is revealed. Examining the transition from the strong belief of nineteenth-century Canadians in the British character of their country to the realities of modern multicultural Canada, this book eschews nostalgia in its endeavour to understand the dynamic and complicated society in which Canadians did and do live.

Examining the complex and rapidly expanding world of print culture and reading in the nineteenth century, Linda E. Connors and Mary Lu MacDonald show how periodicals in the United Kingdom and British North America shaped and promoted ideals about national identity. In the wake of the Napoleonic wars, periodicals instilled in readers an awareness of cultures, places and ways of living outside their own experience, while also proffering messages about what it meant to be British. The authors cast a wide net, showing the importance of periodicals for understanding political and economic life, faith and religion, the world of women and children, the idea of progress as a transcendent ideology, and the relationships between the parts (for example, Scotland or Nova Scotia) and the whole (Great Britain). Analyzing the British identity of expatriate nineteenth-century Britons in North America alongside their counterparts in Great Britain enables insights into whether residents were encouraged to identify themselves by country of residence, by country of birth, or by their newly acquired understanding of a broader whole. Enhanced by a succinct and informative catalogue of data, including editorship and price, about the periodicals analyzed, this study provides a striking history of the era and brings clarity to the perception of British transcendence and progress that emerged with such force and appeal after 1815.