I'm English

No. Why would I be? I'm happy to call the countries in the UK by their names and I'm also happy to call the UK the UK, depending on context. In the context of genealogy, I can see that the individual names of the countries in the UK could be very important, as could the counties, towns and villages.

MrBags has done some genealogical research and discovered that some of his not too distant ancestors were Cornishmen rather than Welshmen (though there may not be much difference in fact, both having a lot of Celtic connections), that one of his grandfathers was born in Melbourne, Australia (though grew up in Walses), and that one of his grandmothers was from Cork, Ireland. He had thought he was Welsh through and through, though actually, his eyes give away some Norse ancestry as well, which I noticed when we live in Oslo for a bit: I've only ever seen eyes the same colour as his in Norway, and the colour was quite common there

Funnily enough, it was the Scottish referendum on independence that made me comfortable with using UK in my address. Before that I'd always preferred to use Scotland, except when living in England, obviously. The referendum debate focussed my mind on the subject in a way that surprised me.

How can you be two nationalities? And why would you be?

The official name of the UK is the "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland." Choose your own little bit depending on your allegiencies.
Thank heavens all the countries are listed alphbetically.

If the pull-down menu of countries of residence uses GB instead of UK, where does that leave Northern Ireland? I am Scottish by birth and accent, have lived in England for 46 years and and am a citizen of the UK of GB and NI.

marmark1

There must be millions of people who have dual nationality - but if the form asks for 'country of birth' then the answer is obvious.

why would you be because the country where you choose to live may not be the country of your birth and you wish to apply for nationality of your country of residence. Some birth countries may make you relinquish your original nationality but most do not.
I know someone with triple nationality.

Quite often (but not always) if you press the "u" on your keyboard it will take you down to the u on the dropdown list.

Is there another country which consists of four countries ? Ireland is two countries and there is N and S Korea , where else?

North and South Korea are not united legally. Neither are Eire and Northern Ireland. England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales (alphabetical order) are so Wales is not a separate country in the same way as the examples you give, ab. Neither is Scotland. Nor Northern Ireland. They retain their individual identities in many things, but legally they are united up to a point under the government of the United Kingdom. This cannot be said of The Koreas or the two parts of the island of Ireland.

I realise, however, that it is your hobby horse, so I wish you happy riding

i'm english, always have been and always will be. and we never seem to be able to enter this as our nationality - however and welsh, irish and scottish seem to be able to on some forms.

i was born in england and live in england and while the rest of the uk [not as united as they once were unfortunately] is lovely for visiting now and again, i love to be able to come home to england.

england is a country and i was born here - not the british isles, great britain or the united kingdom.

Well, actually, you were born in the British Isles and in Great Britain as well as in England because England is part of those entities whether it belongs to the same country as the rest of Great Britain (all the mainland that makes up England, scotland and Wales; the great refers to the largeness of that island, not to plitical greatness) and the rest of the British Isles, which latter contains all of Ireland as well as all the islands around Ireland and Great Britain.

The British Isles is not a political entity. Neither is Great Britain (though the term is often used as if it were). The UK, on the other hand, is a political entity, to which England, amongst other places, belongs. So your nationality is British. You can call yourself English and I can call myself Lancastrian or a naturalised Scot, as the fancy takes me.

Reading through that, I'm thinking that really we should be calling our nationality UKish because residents of Eire are "British" in one sense too.

So in the end, it's all just word play.

As you were.

Perhaps the problem is that nationality is the wrong word. It should be "citizenship" or some other term that encompasses all the nationalities of the population of the UK.

Nationality (on forms): British (and proud to be)
Country of birth: England
Nationality within the UK: English (and proud to be )

Thankyou for that Jalima,sorry for being so thick.

Marmark1
not at all - it's usually me that is
(some of my family have dual nationality)

My passport says that I am a British Citizen

Many foreigners think England refers to the UK and Britain refers to England. They also think if we are English we all live in London.

Always say I am English which I am. Some helpful sites list UK and USA at the top but at least having 2 U,s next to one another makes it easier to find.

I deeply resent being lumped into United Kingdom when I feel purely Scottish. I particularly hate it when I'm doing online surveys and they list Scotland as a "region" rather than a country in its own right.

I don't dislike the English per se - my son is half English - but having lived in England for a few years, I can vouch for the fact that culturally we're distinctly different.

My BF was Scottish and I don't think she was culturally any different from me (apart from a few linguistic quirks on both our parts).

I never think of myself as British ,

I always think of myself as British.

Poshpaws having visited Scotland a number of times I'm curious that you find England so very culturally different - can you elaborate?

Hmm. Well, poshpaws, two of my daughters are part Scottish, part Irish and part English, one of my daughters is part Welsh, rathermore part Irish, and part English,
I am part English and part Irish and we are all culturally very similar.

I got very confused the other day when talking to someone at the DWP. Well they upset me so my confusion was even more that usual lol. He asked me what country I came from so I said, 'Great Britain'. He said that was wrong and what country did I come from so I said, 'the United Kingdom'. He said that was wrong. I began to panic and said that I didn't understand the question and could he give me a clue to what he actually wanted. He just kept repeating himself and I got more and more upset. Finally it dawned on me he wasn't asking my nationality but my regional country so I said, 'England'. Hurrah the right answer.

I am British and quite happy to scroll down to UK. (It quite often comes at the top anyway.) I would only ever put England if asked the place of birth.
I never address envelopes to Scotland, Wales etc I just put the county and post code. If sending from abroad I put UK.

I have two Welsh sons in law and one English son in law, culturally different. I have four English cousins and fourteen Welsh cousins , again culturally different . We have always struggled to find any similarities between the four in Watford and us nineteen in Wales , we have all tried but failed