Recently the Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell, published a wide-ranging piece dealing with - amongst other issues - national identity (1). In it, he described a slightly bloodless experience of identity and belonging:
"When I grew up in the 1960s, I thought of myself as British. I knew I was English, but it was less significant for my identity. I was aware of our difficult history but rather proud of the pragmatism and vision that had created an experiment in nationhood: different nations living as one. I was British and English. My country was the United Kingdom of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland: complicated, but it seemed to work."
He describes a dilemma of belonging he observed during the 2020 European Championships that could affect all sports fans in the UK. As might be expected of someone with significant organisational responsibilities, he is concerned that people know their place and sing the administratively correct song:
"... both nations, England and Scotland, belong to one nation, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. We should, surely, have sung one national anthem. But the Scots, with impressive zest, sang Flower of Scotland. And the English sang God Save the Queen. The National Anthem of both nations became just the English anthem....Then when the different nations of the United Kingdom find themselves pitched against each other on the sports field we could belt out our individual anthems. Then sing our National Anthem together. And love our neighbour."
If that's slightly bloodless, well, that's not a moral failing. Everyone has their own characteristic arrangement of feelings and interests, and some people feel identity and belonging more than others. However, the Church of England is supposed to be the steward of our nation's spiritual life, and the Archbishop is right at the top of it. You might feel a bit short-changed by that if you are someone who feels passionately about the country that formed you, and the soil you grew in. Sports fans usually know which song they're going to sing - they're not waiting for guidance.
Carl Benjamin (2) points out that identities are often different types of thing, even if they are often conflated.
New Culture Forum: ... Would you say you are a proud Englishman...?
Carl Benjamin: Absolutely.
NCF: ...as opposed to a proud British man?
CB : Well, I think, when you say "British man" it sounds weird, doesn't it ?
NCF: Yes, it does, because I don't know what to assume.
CB : Well, that's because that's not really a thing. British isn't an ethnic group, it's a civic identity. I think it's a valuable one, and I think it's good that we can have that open to everyone. But English is an ethnic identity, and I think it is wrong to try and take people's ethnic identities away from them."
Neil Oliver (3) describes a British identity that is altogether more wholehearted than the Archbishop:
GB News: "You're someone who is proud of your British identity, and feels it's important that you're British, and you have a dual identity of British and Scottish. That's not such a fashionable view north of the border now."
Neil Oliver: "It has certainly been the case in the last number of years that there seems to be an expectation that you must make a choice that you're either Scottish or British. But I know that as I was growing up - and really to this day - I've always felt British and Scottish at the same time. And for the longest time it was never political - it was more of a statement of geographical fact: these are the British isles and as a citizen belonging to that place I regarded myself as British. I see no schizophrenia in it. I feel that I can be more than one thing at a time I'm a husband, and I'm a dad, and we are a family; and likewise I am Scottish and I am British. And we are a bigger family, and that enriches my experience of what it is to be in this landscape. And to the day I die I will consider myself to be British."
Belonging is not a simple thing, as an experience or as a concept. It has either a range of modes, or is a collection of different feelings, depending on how you want to describe it. For example, the intensely-focussed, transitory, competitive tribal belonging of a sporting derby is very different from the stable, diffuse warmth of belonging to a family. However, there is little difficulty negotiating both feelings, even at the same moment.
What belonging isn't, though, is a simple administrative category, no matter how useful those are for politicians, activists, administrators, journalists and academics. Empire-builders and separatists both often use a narrative of national identity. Empire-builders simplify and downplay the differences in identity to build consent for political authority. Separatists simplify and emphasise the differences to leverage them into demands for political recognition. There's nothing inherently right or wrong about either approach, although both can be either. The point is there is a difference between the romantic, or psychological, experience of belonging; and the political requirement for administrative categories. It is wise not to get the two mixed up.
Neil Oliver: "If you fall in love with a person, you want to know all about them – the good and bad, happy and sad, triumphs and disasters. That’s how it is for me with Great Britain. The oldest human footprints we know about here in Great Britain were pressed into the mud of what is now Norfolk around a million years ago...Great Britain, like every other country, is a dream. There is no such place - unless enough of us say there is. If the day comes when too many people cease to believe in Great Britain, then it's over. It’s a book full of stories and characters, dramas, adventures, light and dark. I love the depth, the great whirling, mystifying, mesmerising, shocking, thrilling story of it all." (4)
1) https://www.archbishopofyork.org/news/latest-news/courageous-and-compassionate-search-english
2)
New Culture Forum Carl Benjamin: An Elegy for England & English Morality August 1st 2021
3)
GB News Neil Oliver 13th June 2021