As a Scot, to ask 'What is Englishness?

We lived in France for 10 years. We could not have had more welcoming, helpful neighbours who eventually became and still are close friends. But at some point we began to miss home and our own people, who, we identified with more.

As you say MargaretX you don't know how a Scot feels so I have no way of sharing these feelings with you. For me, it is simply, home.

Can I ask those of you who are English living abroad, do you feel that same pull to return to live in England?

Having only recently moved abroad I have to say that I am desperately missing my friends. I haven't yet made any new ones, although I am on good terms with my charming neighbours. Consequently, I do feel quite lonely. (Anyone who has read another current thread will appreciate that the bond between Mr absent and me is somewhat cracked and patched.) Do I miss England? No – but then I am in an anglophone country and living in a place surrounded by hills reminiscent of the best of the countryside in many parts of England. The town is even called Richmond – and I know both the one in Yorkshire and the one in Surrey quite well.

perhaps being English or Englishness is like the kid who starts school, secure in the knowledge that s/he is well loved and cared for so does not cling or worry because they have a secure sense of self. they cannot articulate what it is as it is just who they are!

Apart from the unknown origins of my PGF, most of my ancestors are very much from rural England back to around the mid 1700s as known of. They are very Midlands based, I will include Cheshire as Midlands there and then mostly Leicestershire and its surrounding counties.

Living in an area that is so reminiscent of home must help, also having family and precious grandchildren there must make a huge difference.

I sincerely hope that you will make some good friends and you personally find contentment. All the best Absent

I'm a bit puzzled as to why you think an English person living abroad should be different to anyone else, Agus? Some of us would be homesick, others wouldn't, we're all individuals. I thoroughly enjoyed life in Germany for a couple of years before yearning for England, so I came home. At that stage I was missing the place so much I nearly kissed the ground. I dare say others would happily have stayed.

The Scotsman David Davidson, Politician
“I’m not sure there is such a thing as Englishness, it varies so much. Scots don’t walk through Glasgow in a kilt, on the whole, and the English no longer walk through London in funny hats.”

The Welshman Rob Brydon, Comic
“Scots say, ‘The English can take our land, but never take our freedom.’
The Welsh say: ‘You’ve taken our land: don’t forget our freedom before you go. Thanks for coming!’ ”

The Irishman Dara O Briain, Comic
“London is hosting the Olympics, yet you all talk about how terrible the country is . . . and then there’s that giggly, Carry On attitude to sex, that is unique. But you don’t realise any of this.”

Maggiemaybe because the post is asking 'what is Englishness' so I posed the question to English posters living abroad.

Not questioning anyone's individuality just asking posters if they had the strong pull to return home that I felt. Which you say you had.

I would pose the same question to Welsh or Irish if this post was referring to them.

How many of us are actually English? My grandfather was Irish, my husband's grandfather was Italian, my son in law is American and my soon to be daughter in law is Hungarian. My three grandchildren are complete mongrels. The next generation will probably be even more complicated.

Yes - my next generation already includes, as well as the whole UK, some Hungarian, Jamaican and old Norman French.....yeah, from 1066....

One GC has African-Caribbean heritage; others have Welsh and yet others Irish blood. All that in addition to the Scottish Celtic, Norman, Anglo Saxon and very probably Viking blood from my family and my ex's.

Agusasked:
Can I ask those of you who are English living abroad, do you feel that same pull to return to live in England?

For me, in Australia since the year Thatcher was elected (1979), the pull of England is always there. It is the feeling of wanting to be where I belong, where my accent doesn't label me. I remain English even though I have been an Australian citizen since 1982. I love tea, I'm polite, I moan about the weather, I have a home that is cluttered and cosy.....

But the England I left is no more - Thatcher saw to that. In any case, almost every country changes in three and a half decades. Without trying, I've become Australian and I do admire much about my adopted country.

But - whatever it is to be English, I'm still that.

Of course, racially I'm probably Celtic, Scandinavian and Russian Jewish. I guess that makes me extremely English - we are all a mishmash, as Daniel Defoe's poem so eloquently explains:
www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/173337

I love your description of what being English means to you Joan.

There is a well known word in Welsh which I think sums this up, I have heard Welsh actors who have moved to and live in America speak of it in interviews ,

Hirieth. Which mean a longing, not homesickness, it was once explained to me as an invisible umbilical cord which connects one with the land of their birth

Joan What a lovely post! I agree with everything you feel. And you are definitely a polite English lady in answering Agus' genuine question.

I'm a 35yr old Glaswegian living in Brisbane and I totally 'get' what you are saying. You miss where you just belong and I do find it tiresome being an immigrant of sorts. Sometimes I just want to blend in.

Although I receive lovely comments about my accent daily (I work in property so meet a lot of people) and thankfully do not get too many questions as to why I am here (as you will know, there are gazillions of Brits here so it's quite normal to meet them daily if you're an Aussie) as it does get tiresome, I do miss the humour of home and just slotting in. I find myself looking up Scottish comedians on YouTube every couple of months for a taste of home and a good giggle.

I miss many things from home, but nothing as much as my Mum.

My Mum in Law is English and her 4 grown up children all grew up here with an Aussie Dad, so she and I have a wonderful little British 'thing' that makes my settlement much easier. I'm very lucky to have that.

I've only been here 18 months (my partner is from here obviously), but have lived all over the world for the last 10 years, but I do love it. But it is true, there is no place like home, and I can't wait to go home for Christmas, especially to see my Mammy.

All the best to you, wherever in this big land you are.

I live not all that far from you, GaolMoCridhe, in the eastern side of Ipswich!

Funnily enough, one of my brothers lives in - Glasgow!!

Joan I thought you may be in Perth as there are so many Brits there! We live in Oxley so really not far from you at all. My OH is from the western suburbs (Chapel Hill) so we are not too close, but not too far from his parents. It works wonderfully. We are in the middle for both of us for work.

I work in Sunnybank and tonight at 6.30 I had to drive to Toowong to look at a property. I was driving over the Captain Cook Bridge on the Pacific Highway and all of the city lights were on and I just thought, "Isn't this a wonderful city to live in!" It's brilliant!

It's so funny that one of your brothers lives in Glasgow.....! I'm from the south side if he is around there? I hope he is happy there.

Best to you.
xxx

I enjoyed the Defoe poem, Joan and am surprised that it was unfamiliar. If such perceptions were true 400 years ago, how much more true are they now!

Thank you for that link to the poem! I have always considered myself a mongrel.

I've always wondered where I belong.
Since I have researched my family history, I feel that it's the people I have come from, not the places, that matter - I think about them and feel the real romance of my family stories.

Not for me AlieOxon.
My home is where I am from and that is what I miss.
Why would I miss ancestors that I do not know?

Could you explain why you feel a kinship to countries that you have never been to? It's a really interesting thought and one which I would love to hear more about.

There's a village churchyard in Leicestershire where a large number of my ancestors are buried in a big family tomb and I would like to go back sometime and commune with them; but when I cross the Border into Scotland, I really know I'm going home - my accent changes noticeably.

GaolMoCridhe My brother lived in Neilston where he brought up his kids, who are effectively Scottish now, with Scottish accents, though one lives in the USA, and the other stayed in Scotland but married a Dutchman. Now my brother is retired, they've moved to Barrhead. I've never been, so I've no idea what these places are like.

My sister married a Scot from Edinburgh, though he spent his teenage years in Leicestershire. They live in France now. I married a fellow Yorkie, and we ended up in Australia. It is funny how multicultural we have all become, from our mono-cultural origins in a West Yorkshire mill town. I've also lived in Vienna and NZ.

Here in Queensland, we live in Dinmore: we've one married son in Sherwood, just round the corner from the cop shop there, and the other living in Runcorn with his gorgeous Cantonese fiancee. We've got a Chinese/Australian wedding coming up next year.

Gosh - I hadn't realised what a mix we all are!!

I have a friend from Oxley - well, she's from Watford really, but lived on Britain Street with her first husband. She married again and lived Northside, but now lives on her own near Oxley - in Durack.

Small world eh?

Daniel Defoe would be proud of us!

joan a bit of sensible German philosophy.
Die Fremde wird nicht Heimat, aber die Heimat fremd.

ABOAD WILL NEVER QUITE BE HOME, BUT HOME WILL BECOME STRANGE/FOREIGN

To understand this you have to appreciate the word Heimat which is almost untranslatable. It is so heavy with emotional meaning.

I am sure that is what everybody misses when they go abroad but being abroad changes us! Because we change we are sometimes treated by friends and family at home as being foreign. especially in political arguments.
I remember my brother saying to me 'You Germans!' as we were discussing the Common Market as it was then. I felt very hurt by this but it warned me that I was no longer regarded as quite so English as those who live there permanently.

The language is important and now with Satellite dishes and internet we can indulge as much as we want. I missed it painfully in the beginning.

Yes, I agree Margaret - once you have made that journey, and stayed for a while in your new country, nothing is ever the same again. You are not quite local, but don't quite belong back home.