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When is a Nation not a Nation? The Case ofAnglo-British NationhoodJ. JacobsonPublished online: 08 Sep 2010.
To cite this article: J. Jacobson (2002) When is a Nation not a Nation? The Case of Anglo-British Nationhood,Geopolitics, 7:2, 173-192
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When is a Nation not a Nation? The Case of Anglo-British Nationhood
JESSICA JACOBSON
This article examines the articulation of Anglo-British national identity in the tabloidPress, paying particular attention to how the emotions of shame, sorrow, defiance andnostalgia underlie much tabloid discourse of nationhood. These are depicted either asemotions aroused in the writer (and, by extension, the reader) by aspects of the Anglo-British nation; or as emotions which the nation itself (and, again, the reader) isexperiencing. The exaggeration and intensity of this discourse suggests that the tabloidsare adopting a special role in defending not only the virtues of the Anglo-British nationbut also the very notion of nationhood, at a time when this is being undermined byvarious social, political and economic forces. The study thus provides insight into thedynamic and contested character of contemporary Anglo-Britishness, and illustratesthat the nation is a process rather than an entity that either exists or does not exist.
Introduction
The aim of this article is to examine the ways in which national identity isarticulated in the British tabloid Press. In particular, it looks at how theemotions of shame, sorrow, defiance and nostalgia underlie a great deal ofcontemporary tabloid talk about the nation.
The discursive approach adopted by this study is rooted in theassumption that national identity, like all forms of collective identity,evolves through processes of establishing similarities and differencesbetween individuals and groups. Identity is about the meaning given tothese similarities and differences, and hence is a matter of negotiation,argument and counter-argument. In this sense, identity itself is created andmanifested through public and private discourse.
The term ‘discourse’, which is a core concept in this article, refers herenot simply to conversation between individuals but is also used as ametaphor to denote the ‘social dialogue’ – in both oral and written form –that takes place among political and social actors, whether as individuals,groups or institutions. Society is thus regarded as the context in which social
Jessica Jacobson, Freelance Researcher, London. Email: <[email protected]>.
Geopolitics, Vol.7, No.2 (Autumn 2002) pp.173–192PUBLISHED BY FRANK CASS, LONDON
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agents engage in communicative interaction; interaction which does notnecessarily demand the physical presence of the agents and does not usuallytake the form of a continuous dialogue.
One main stream of research in the analysis of discourse is represented bythe work of Gamson, Snow, Benford and their collaborators.1 Their researchis based on a constructivist approach towards reality; that is, discourse isviewed as a language act through which symbolic constructs are made real.Social agents use these constructs not simply to make sense of reality but alsoto formulate in a particular way the world that surrounds them. In other words,discourse here entails the negotiation and (re)construction of reality byindividuals or groups through the use of symbolic tools. From thisperspective, discourse is seen as the context in which communicativeinteraction takes place, and as the process by which society itself isreproduced. For the purposes of this article, this view of discourse as contextis adopted. More specifically, the focus of attention is on the production ofdiscourse by one section of the mass media: namely, the popular Press.
There are a number of theories analysing the role and importance ofmass communications within contemporary society.2 The theoreticalperspective adopted here is derived partly from the agenda-settingapproach, which is concerned not so much with how the media persuadepeople of one thing or another, but with how they describe social reality andpresent a list of issues which people need to have an opinion on and/or talkabout.3 Thus the focus is on the role of the mass media as mediators of socialreality. Indeed, one can argue that the media act as mediators not simplythrough setting the agenda, namely the issues that should be seen as publicproblems,4 but also through, to a large extent, defining the terms in whichthese issues should be understood and debated. They provide topics,symbols, images and narrative structures as well as ideologies and valuesthat may be used in public or private discourse. This discursive universe isa source of knowledge for the public, and also sets limits to this knowledge.
The importance of the Press in giving shape to conceptions ofnationhood has been highlighted by Benedict Anderson. According toAnderson, the very possibility of the ‘imagining’ of nationhood was broughtabout in part by the rapid expansion in newspaper readership in eighteenth-century Europe. Anderson argues that newspaper-reading is a kind of ‘massceremony’ of the nation, which has a paradoxical significance:
It is performed in silent privacy, in the lair of the skull. Yet eachcommunicant is well aware that the ceremony he performs is beingreplicated simultaneously by thousands (or millions) of others ofwhose existence he is confident, yet of whose identity he has not theslightest notion.5
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The focus of this article is on the actual content of Press discourse, ratherthan on its consumption. The analysis of this discourse offers an effectivemeans of grasping the mutations and transformations of national identity. Itpermits insight into the ways in which elements taken from tradition andhistory are fused together with contemporary issues and concerns in theprocess of establishing and highlighting the presumed similarities anddifferences upon which the sense of national identity is based. Theapplication of this approach to the case of Anglo-British nationhood seemsparticularly appropriate, since its emphasis on communication andinterpretation as the foundations of social reality permit the researcher touncover some of the manifold contradictions and ambiguities that – as willbe illustrated below – run through this nation’s sense of itself.
By highlighting the fluidity and dynamic character of national identity,this paper illustrates the fact that nationhood is a process rather than anentity that either exists or does not exist. Thus, although any nation is rootedin the history of a country and/or a people, it is not possible to defineempirically the moment of its birth or reawakening and hence provide adefinitive answer to the question: when is the Anglo-British nation? Thequestion that this paper seeks to address, in analysing certain contemporaryexpressions of Anglo-British national identity, is therefore not so much oneof ‘When is the nation?’ as that of ‘How is the nation?’.
Anglo-British Nationhood
The term Anglo-British nationhood refers to the fused sense of nationalitymaintained by the English, who, as members of the dominant nation withinthe multi-national British state (and wider still United Kingdom, whichincorporates Northern Ireland as well as Scotland and Wales), have a habitof moving between a narrower English and broader British self-definition,while being scarcely conscious of this continuous shifting. Indeed, thetabloid discourse of nationhood to be examined below itself providesevidence of this shifting of focus: the ‘nation’ of and to which the papersspeak is on some occasions, quite explicitly, England (for example, inreports on the English football team and English football hooligans), but onother occasions is evidently Britain (as in discussions of the British ArmedForces or the decline of the British Empire), or is left undefined.6
It can be argued that the ease with which Englishness and Britishnessslide into each other is a consequence of ‘the intimate yet superior way inwhich the English have lived with so many other groups’.7 For the English,it seems that a sense of superiority with regard to their national identity hastraditionally existed hand-in-hand with a sense of stability. As has beennoted by Seton-Watson, among others, England is, in many senses, an ‘old,
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continuous nation’, the subjective and objective dimensions of whichevolved gradually over centuries.8 It is also a nation which, through its longhistory – encompassing the rise of the British state and empire, theexperience of two world wars, and even the years of decline of empire – hasrarely come under direct or sustained (external or internal) threat.
At the present time, however, it appears that much public discourseabout Anglo-British nationhood, far from reflecting a sense of stability andsuperiority, is giving expression to uncertainty, doubt and even confusion.What was once taken for granted, it seems, is now constantly open toquestion and argument. This is doubtless in part a manifestation of thenumerous pressures – political, economic, cultural, technological – that canbe said to be undermining the very concept of nationhood across the globe.But it appears that many issues and processes have a particular or specificrelevance to the British case. Extensive debate is being conducted inacademic literature and in the ‘serious’ Press and broadcast media about thenature of British and English national identity; about who exactly the British(or English) are, or who they think they are.9 Such debate grapples with theproblem of understanding the repercussions for English or Britishnationhood of processes such as devolution (that is, the establishment of aScottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly); continuing Europeanintegration; the increasingly multi-ethnic and multicultural character ofBritain’s larger cities and towns and certain public expressions of nationalculture; economic globalisation; and the coming to terms with the facts ofBritain’s loss of Empire and relative political and economic decline sincethe end of the Second World War.
Thus the public discourse of nationhood emanating from the ‘serious’media and sections of academia suggests that there is some kind of crisis ofAnglo-British nationhood. This is part of the context within which tabloidnewspapers are presenting their own conceptions of the nation. As we shallsee, it is against this background of talk of crisis that the tabloids articulatetheir highly emotive and often contradictory views of nationhood.
Methodology
This study involved the examination of three national daily newspaperswhich can all be characterised as ‘tabloid’ on grounds of their mass appealand small-sized pages. The three papers are:
• The Sun, a down-market, right-of-centre tabloid, owned by RupertMurdoch’s News International, which also owns the News of the World,Times and Sunday Times. With a circulation of approximately 3.6million, the Sun is the most popular daily newspaper in Britain.
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• The Mirror, a down-market, left-of-centre tabloid with a circulation of2.1 million. The Mirror is owned by Trinity Mirror, whose othernewspapers include the Sunday Mirror, Sunday People and the Scottishpapers the Daily Record and Sunday Mail.
• The Daily Mail, Britain’s best-selling middle-market tabloid since thelate 1980s (circulation: 2.3 million), which is firmly positioned on theright of the political spectrum. This is owned by the Daily Mail andGeneral Trust, as are the Mail on Sunday and the Evening Standard(London’s evening newspaper).10
The above three tabloid newspapers were selected for study because theyprovided scope for analysis of a range of expressions of national identity,due to their differing political perspectives and market status. In addition,their high circulation figures attest to their significance in the cultural andpolitical life of contemporary Britain. (It should be noted, for example, thatmuch has been made throughout the media of current Prime Minister TonyBlair’s successful ‘courting’ of the traditionally Conservative Sunnewspaper prior to the Labour election victory of 1997.)
The empirical work carried out for this study entailed the analysis ofnews, editorial and comment articles that appeared over the years 1996 to1999. In order to include in the study as wide a range of material as possible,articles for analysis were taken from issues of the three newspaperspublished during randomly chosen weeks within the three-year period, andalso from issues that appeared at times deemed to be of particular nationalsignificance (specifically, the weeks in which international footballchampionships took place and the days following the death of PrincessDiana). The articles were selected for analysis on the grounds that they dealtwith the broad subject of nationhood: that is, either as an explicit theme oras part of a wider discussion they made reference to the characteristics ofthe British/English nation, national responses to particular issues, or therepercussions for the nation of current events.
A qualitative analysis of the articles in the sample was carried out, whichinvolved the categorisation of the items in terms of their topic, generalorientation, and the broad image of the nation they presented. Through thisprocess of close examination of the articles, certain themes and patternsemerged; and ultimately the pervasiveness of the four moods of shame,sorrow, defiance and nostalgia in the tabloid talk of nationhood wasidentified and reviewed. The focus of this study has thus been on the detailof particular images and styles of expression that are common features ofthe discourse, and no attempt has been made to quantify the appearances ofspecific issues or topics.
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The Discourse of Nationhood in the Tabloid Press
Emotions
A striking example with which to open this discussion of tabloid talk of thenation is provided by the contrast between two headlines from February1999 which deal with the same issue:
Damning verdict that shames the nation (1)11
Britain backs our bobbies (2)
The two articles headlined as above – an editorial in the Mirror, and a newsitem in the Sun, respectively – relate to the publication of the MacPhersonReport into the police handling of a racist murder of a young black teenager,Stephen Lawrence, in 1993.12 The report exposed incompetence and racialprejudice on the part of the police, which had resulted in huge failings intheir investigations.
Hence, in the words of the Mirror, the shaming verdict. The Sun,however, reports the findings of its own ‘exclusive poll’, carried out in theaftermath of the publication of the MacPherson Report, into attitudes of thegeneral public towards the police. This found that ‘officers still have thesupport of ordinary people – white, black and Asian’. What the Sun calls a‘heartening’ total of 74 per cent of those questioned ‘feel they can still trustpolice officers’: thus the claim is made that ‘Britain backs our bobbies’.
What is interesting about these two articles is not so much the differencebetween them (which is not unexpected, given that the two papers havedifferent political stances) but the fact that both adopt a strongly nationalperspective on the matter of the MacPherson inquiry. That is, both articlesare concerned with how the nation feels in relation to this issue. Moreover,the terms employed in this nation-oriented discourse are emotionallycharged. In the Sun, the rhetoric is defiant: the paper is proudly assertingthat whatever problems the police might face, the British public stillsupports them. In the article in the Mirror, on the other hand, the chiefemotion is shame: the whole nation, no less, is shamed by what hashappened.
As will be demonstrated below, this kind of national perspective on theissue at hand, and the emotional terms in which the debate is framed, are byno means uncommon. The process of agenda-setting that is evident in thiskind of tabloid rhetoric can be said to have three essential dimensions. Thefirst is the assumption that the nation is a self-evident reality: it is taken forgranted that the nation exists, and that the concept of nationhood ismeaningful and understandable to all. Secondly, this nation is presented asan entity capable of making an emotional response to a given issue: Britainhas chosen to ‘back our bobbies’, according to the Sun; according to the
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Mirror, the verdict of the MacPherson report has had the effect of makingthe nation feel ashamed. The third dimension is the implicit or explicit callon the reader to feel a particular way along with the rest of the nation. In theSun’s account of its post-MacPherson opinion poll there appears to be a pleato readers to join (the majority of) their fellow-nationals in supporting ‘our’beleaguered bobbies. In the Mirror editorial on MacPherson it is assertedthat the report poses ‘a challenge to us all’: that is, the challenge ‘[t]o get ridof racism in our workplaces, communities and homes’.
This study has found that four particular emotions underlie a great dealof the tabloid discourse of nationhood. These are depicted either asemotions supposedly aroused in the writer (and, by extension, the reader) byaspects of the contemporary nation; or as emotions which, as in the aboveexamples, the nation itself (and again, by extension, the reader) is said toexperience. As already observed, one of these emotions is defiance, as thenewspapers proclaim the importance of asserting and defending what is bestabout the nation; and another emotion is shame, with regard to the moralfailings of the British (or English) people, or to the weakness or corruptionof the nation’s elites and core institutions. The third emotion is nostalgia,which, it seems, cannot be avoided in considerations of the better aspects oflife in Britain today – for it would appear that most of these better aspectsare rooted in the past, and indeed are under threat in the present age. Finally,there is sorrow: for perhaps the most vigorous assertions of nationhoodappear when there is talk of the nation being in mourning; when the nationexpresses itself in the wake of a tragedy.
It is striking that this emotional rhetoric in the British tabloid Pressaccompanies a wider sense – discussed above – that some or many of thecomponents of this nation are in fact being undermined, or are in crisis. Thisindicates, perhaps, that the tabloid Press discourse of nationhood hasbecome so emotionally charged precisely because of the crisis ofnationhood: because the existence of the nation can no longer be taken forgranted. In this situation of rapid change and uncertainty, the tabloid Pressappears to provide recourse to older, unquestioned definitions of the nation:the discursive universe created by these newspapers is a universe in whichAnglo-British nationhood is meaningful and significant, at a time when thatmeaning and significance is frequently being denied or is increasinglydifficult to grasp. Furthermore, in an age when the traditional role of thenational newspaper – that is, as a provider of news coverage – has beentaken up by so many other forms of mass media, the newspaper needs someextra function to give it a competitive edge. Its loud and emotive claim tospeak to and on behalf of ‘the nation’ may just fulfil this need.
The remainder of this paper will focus on the four emotions of defiance,shame, sorrow and nostalgia, as these are manifest in the tabloid discourse
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of nationhood. More precisely, six varied issues which have given rise tomuch of this tabloid talk of the nation over the past four years will beexamined in turn: namely, the armed forces, football, European integration,British history, the tragedy of Dunblane and the death of Princess Diana.
The Armed Forces
An example has been provided, above, of how the police have beenportrayed as an institution in shameful decline, and, alternatively, as aninstitution treasured by the people – but, either way, as a core institution ofthe nation and a focus of strong national feelings. Something similar isapparent in much tabloid discussion of the armed forces. For example, a Suneditorial headed ‘Drugs shame’ informs readers about a drugs scandal in theForces, and comments that ‘the proud name of those who serve Queen andCountry is being besmirched by a tiny minority … betraying the uniformthey wear’ (3).
Sorrow and nostalgia are manifest in another Sun editorial, whichfocuses on the decline of the British navy. This asserts:
The mighty fleet of the British Empire once commanded the sevenseas. Hearts of oak were our men, hearts of oak were our ships … Butwhat a joke that Britain now has more admirals than warships (4).
There is plenty of defiant rhetoric in evidence when the newspapers takeon the task of informing their readers about what is best about the Britisharmed forces. One learns, for example – to quote a Daily Mail headline –that in the war in Kosovo ‘Our elite forces will lead the way’ (5). The articlegoes on to explain that ‘Elite British forces will spearhead the deploymentof a massive NATO peacekeeping army in Kosovo’. Other articles whichappear in the Daily Mail at around the same time are headlined as follows:
Let’s get on with the job – crack British troops spearhead NATOmarch into Kosovo (6);We’ll do the dirty work, say the British (7);Peace dawns at last as the Paras go in (8).
At the same time – as is very common in much of the defiant tabloiddiscourse of nationhood – it is made clear to Daily Mail readers that theachievements of the British are being undermined by foreigners. In thiscase, the foreigners are the Americans: one article is headed: ‘Put peace onhold, for the US to grab all the glory’ (9). The reporter elaborates:
Yesterday, Bill Clinton had decreed that 2000 US Marines, not Britishsoldiers, must be the first Nato troops into Kosovo. Not that theAmericans are even going to the danger areas … They will be dropped
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by helicopter – and under the full glare of the television networks –into one of the safest places in Kosovo.
On another occasion the Daily Mail is concerned with a very differentexample of the failure of foreigners to appreciate the strengths of the BritishArmed Forces. In an editorial headed ‘Foreign judges and Britain’s defence’(10), readers are informed of the decision taken by the European Court ofHuman Rights that homosexuals should be allowed to serve in the Britishmilitary. The response of the newspaper is clear:
And who, might you ask, were the authors of this edict? They include:a judge from Albania, a failed Communist state with an atrocioushuman rights record. A Lithuanian whose tiny country was occupiedby the Nazis and annexed by the Russians … These are surely notnations which have much to teach this country about human rights –far less about how to run an effective fighting force.
Football
Football is a topic which commands a great deal of attention in the tabloidPress (and indeed across all forms of the mass media), which extends farbeyond coverage of national and international football matches. In the pages ofthe Sun, Mirror and Daily Mail, football is a subject which often, it seems,gives cause to consider the current state of the nation. In this context, the‘nation’ in question is – quite explicitly – England rather than Britain, by virtueof the fact that there is no British football team. Indeed, accounts of the rivalrybetween the England and Scotland teams, and also the contrast sometimesdrawn between badly behaved England fans and relatively well behavedScotland fans, bring into focus conceptions of a distinct English nationhood.
The emotion of nostalgia is evident in a substantial amount of footballwriting. Readers are invited to enjoy memories of a past, happier era ofEnglish football. In that by-gone age, those who represented England on thefootball field were, apparently, well-behaved, modest, poorly paid – sodifferent to the overpaid, arrogant superstars of today. Moreover, back in 1966the England team achieved something it has hardly come near to achievingsince: that is, it won the World Cup. The coverage in the tabloid Press of boththe European football championship of 1996 (known as Euro 96) and the1998 World Cup abounds with references to the virtues of the past. A reportin the Daily Mail, for example, describes the lives of the heroes of 1966:
They calmed their nerves at the local cinema, slept in on the morningof the match and stopped for egg and chips on the journey home. Buton July 30, 1966, 11 extraordinary men achieved a nation’s dream:winning the World Cup for England (11).
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Today, in contrast, it is asserted that many members of the England footballteam engage in deeply shameful behaviour. During the build-up to Euro 96,for example, the players are said to be disgracing themselves and theircountry with their drunken and loutish antics. A Sun editorial mourns:‘There was a time in football when the name England was synonymous withimpeccable behaviour … Now … our name is trash’ (12).As the 1998 World Cup approaches, readers are once again expected todespair at the misbehaviour of the England players. A Daily Mail essayistconsiders what people in other parts of the world must think:
They must be bemused or, still worse, thoroughly amused at howEngland, once builders of the world’s greatest empire and theoriginators of the game of football, prepare for the biggest sportingtournament on earth (13).
But there is worse shame for England to come: when the World Cup getsunder way in France, rioting by England fans is the cause of more woe. Onthe front page of the Mirror, a direct plea is made to the Prime Minister:‘These moronic, loathsome yobs are humiliating our country and they’remaking you look weak’ (14).
During the 1998 World Cup the England players do at least redeemthemselves, and play reasonably well; but the violence of the fans is such thatthe achievements of the team cannot be fully enjoyed. The best and the worstof the nation are thus starkly opposed in several reports. For example, aftera match in which England struggled valiantly (but lost), a Mirror columnistwrites ‘a tale of two Englishmen’, contrasting an England goal-scorer with ahooligan: ‘one of them made you proud to be English. The other made youthink that something is sick at the heart of this country’ (15).
There is, however, some scope for pride and defiance in the tabloid talkof football. In fact, in the pages of the Sun and Mirror before and duringEuro 96, discussions of football rivalry between England and Germanycontain a number of references to the Second World War. In the build-up tothe Euro 96 semi-final that England played against (and lost to) Germany,the following headlines appear:
Let’s blitz Fritz (Sun) (16)Achtung surrender … for you, Fritz, ze Euro 96 Championships areover [next to a picture of two England players in World War II tinhats] (Mirror) (17)Mirror declares war on Germany (Mirror) (18).13
In July 1999 a football controversy was sparked by the decision by theEnglish league team Manchester United to withdraw from the mostprestigious domestic tournament, the FA Cup, in order to play in an
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international tournament in Brazil. The Mirror took upon itself the task ofseeking to persuade Manchester United to reverse this decision, on thegrounds that the FA Cup – described as ‘the world’s greatest competition’(19) – would be hugely devalued by the absence of this team. Here, then,the Mirror claims that it is speaking on behalf of ordinary football fans, indefiance not only of the ‘foreigners’ running and playing in the Braziliancompetition, but also of the nation’s so-called ‘football bosses’ who areallowing the FA Cup to be ruined. The importance of standing up to thesupposedly arrogant and out-of-touch elites of England/Britain – who areoften held responsible for undermining the nation from within, just as othersare said to attack it from without – is a theme which appears in a great dealof the defiant tabloid discourse of nationhood.
Hence in the Mirror such headlines appear as: ‘Stop [the football bosses]from wrecking the FA Cup and betraying every single football fan in thecountry’ (20) and ‘Hang your heads – Man United chiefs are accused oftreachery’ (19). And a columnist informs readers that: ‘It’s official – ournational game is now in the greasy hands of whores, pimps and traitors’;and that the Brazilian championship is ‘a nothing competition … full ofnothing teams’; a ‘tupperware trophy [which was] the brainchild of abrainless German …’ (21).14
European Integration
As in discussions of football, talk of war crops up in many articles andeditorials about European integration in the anti-European Daily Mail and,especially, the Sun. (The Mirror, in contrast to these two papers, takes abroadly pro-European stance.) The right-wing tabloid Press make the claimthat they have a duty to mount a strong defence of the British nation state inthe face of the encroaching power and influence of the European Union.
Direct references to or comparisons with war-time confrontations withGermany are not uncommon. A Mail columnist claims in April 1996, forexample, that ‘the amount of governing [British MPs] can actually do hasbeen restricted since we agreed to become a colony of the new GermanReich’; and that the Conservative Party must be sure to reserve ‘the right, ifwe continue to suffer in this extension of World War II by economic means,to get out altogether. After all, in the end, even Chamberlain had to take usto war’ (22). The European Union’s ban on exports of British beef in thewake of the BSE crisis in 1996 leads the Sun to head some of its pagesBATTLE FOR BRITAIN ++ BATTLE FOR BRITAIN during this period.The Sun has been campaigning vigorously against the European singlecurrency for some years, and declares that this cause has enormous popularsupport. In June 1998 the editor proclaims that
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The Sun will not flinch from opposing the euro … We will fight, fight,fight. And even if we lose, we hope people will use the words of thegreatest of all Englishmen, Winston Churchill, and say … This wastheir finest hour (23).
This is, again, an example of a newspaper claiming to be defying the elite –in this case, the political elite – in its efforts to serve the needs of the nationand the wishes of ordinary Britons. A Sun editorial from June 1998 isheaded ‘People’s voice will be heard’, and tells the Prime Minister that ‘wespeak for the people. And you ignore the people’s voice at your peril’ (24).From much of the discourse of nationhood in the anti-European papers, itwould appear that the very fact of Britain’s incorporation within theEuropean Union can be seen to epitomise this nation’s loss of politicalpower and authority in the world. For those who remember fondly a timewhen the British Empire had political and economic supremacy, theprospect of Britain becoming no more than one part of a European politycan be dismaying. This is a clear illustration of Britain’s problematicrelationship with its past, which distorts much of what is presented as‘British history’ in the right-wing tabloid Press.
History
A residual grief over the loss of Empire, and a sense of deep disappointmentarising from what is perceived as a more generalised decline in Britishpower, influence and even the standing and standards of its core institutions,permeates much of what the Sun and, in particular, the Daily Mail, have tosay about the history of this nation. These examples of sorrow over thelosses suffered, and nostalgia for the days when Britain was (it is assumed)a truly great nation, merge with sharp criticisms of what is seen to be theprevailing historical discourse articulated by the liberal elites. It is arguedthat those who hold positions of authority in many sections of the media,politics and the Arts continuously fail to appreciate, and even deliberatelydenigrate, all that is there is to be proud of in the history of Britain.
A Daily Mail columnist, for example, pours scorn on governmentministers who wish to ‘wipe out much of what most of us understand as ournational identity’ – which includes, he argues, ‘our victories in two WorldWars, the spread of civilisation through Empire, and, above all, thepeculiarly British and Christian virtue of tolerance’ (25). A Sun columnistwrites of a ‘softly softly process that seeks to strip us of our nationalidentity’. Part of this process, he argues,
is the move to deny our children knowledge of our history … Ourhistory is deemed jingoistic. As if English identity didn’t also includeFlorence Nightingale, Wat Tyler and the Tolpuddle Martyrs … The
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Royal Navy sank the slave trade. We gave parliamentary democracyto the world … The civilisation built on the blood, sweat and sacrificeof our forefathers – does it really mean so little?
This columnist proclaims his disbelief that today’s politicians ‘aredescended from the breed of men who sailed off in wooden ships and carvedout the greatest empire the world has ever seen’ (26).
According to a survey cited in the Daily Mail in June 1999, the failureof Britain’s leaders to acknowledge the very best aspects of Britain’s pasthas led to ‘shameful ignorance’ of history among young people. (Theemotion of shame is an undercurrent in many of the discussions of history,as in much else.) The survey found that
a staggering number of young people know little or nothing about theSecond World War … Most alarming of all … was the revelation that12 per cent of the 450 interviewees did not know that Britain hademerged victorious (27).
For commentators such as these, a proper interpretation of British historyprovides the rest of the world with lessons in virtue and good governancethat have wide application. Hence it is argued in another Daily Mail article,for example, that
While the rest of Europe bleats about a new Charter of Rights, wewere the first nation actually to establish one, through the MagnaCarta in 1215, followed up by the Bill of Rights in 1688 (28).
Dunblane
From the analysis of the tabloid discourse of nationhood reported upon inthis paper, two events stand out as provoking particularly intense talk of thepeople of ‘the nation’ being united, sharing a common experience. In thesetwo cases – namely the massacre of children in a primary school inDunblane, and the death of Princess Diana – it is a shared sorrow that,according to the Press, brings the British people together.
The terrible tragedy in Dunblane produces much discussion of the actsof mourning and remembrance in which the nation is said to be engaged.The following are among the headlines that appear on 14 March 1996, theday after the killings:
The whole nation is appalled says Queen (Daily Mail) (29)The Dunblane massacre – the grief we all share (Daily Mail) (30)A nation weeps (Sun) (31).
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The Sun’s editorial on this day reads as follows: ‘The whole nation, shockedinto disbelief, grieves for [the children of Dunblane] and their families … Thegunshots that rang out in that PE class will echo around the land’ (32). Thesame theme is continued in the editorial of the following day: ‘The massacrehas cast a deep and dark shadow across Britain. A cascade of flowers … willexpress more eloquently than any words the nation’s grief’ (33).
In the reports of the minute’s silence held in memory of the victims – anevent which in itself was an appeal to the nation and hence contributed tothe sense that this was a national tragedy – it is stressed that the occasionbrought people together:
Our nation fell silent yesterday. Across the land, mums, dads andchildren bowed their heads to pay their respects (Sun) (34).
Yesterday the whole of Britain shared … [a silence] … At MaidstonePrison in Kent the staff and 526 inmates all fell silent. The prisoners,who earn 7 pounds a week, have collected more than 1000 pounds forthe families of the dead (Daily Mail) (35).
The latter quotation is particularly interesting. Here, the Daily Mail – anewspaper which is always eager to draw to its readers attention theenormous damage done to the nation by crime and criminals – brings intofocus the participation of prison inmates in the national act of mourning,and hence provides an (atypically) inclusive image of the nation. In thiscontext, it is also of interest to note an extract from a broadsheet newspaper,the Times, which in a similar fashion highlights the part played by anotherwise marginal figure in the collective expression of sorrow for thevictims in Dunblane:
Millions of people around the country paid their own respects to thevictims at 9.30 am … At London Bridge station a homeless manbegging for money joined passengers and staff in their remembrance.Jimmy Herbert, of no fixed address, stood up from his dirty blanketand gave a military salute (36).
The Death of Princess Diana
In the late summer of 1997, the death of Princess Diana gives rise to a greatdeal more talk of a nation united in grief. For many days after the fatal carcrash in Paris, numerous pages of newsprint are given over to depictions ofthe sorrow and the processes of mourning. From the Sun’s account of hercoffin being brought back from France ‘to a grieving Britain … after one ofthe saddest days in our history’ (37); to a Mirror headline describing ‘Anation united in grief – from punks to pensioners they came to say goodbye’
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(38); to a Daily Mail columnist contemplating the fact that ‘we are livingthrough an unprecedented national convulsion of grief’ (39) – the coverageis relentless. As in the coverage of Dunblane, there is an emphasis here onthe inclusiveness of the nation: after all, the ‘punks’ are joining the‘pensioners’ in the act of mourning.
The Prime Minister’s description of Diana as ‘the people’s Princess’ istaken up by the newspapers with alacrity; hence both the Sun and Mirrorwrite of plans for ‘a people’s funeral for a [a/the] people’s princess’ (40; 41).In the words of a Daily Mail headline, the day of the funeral will be a ‘Daythe nation will stand still’ (42); and the Mirror tells its readers, ‘Be silent allBritain’ (43).
According to the Sun, it is not just the British nation that will ‘fall silent’in remembrance of Diana as her funeral takes place: there will be ‘oneminute’s hush all over the world’ (44). Indeed, the Sun tells its readers thatin the wake of Diana’s death ‘the world was awash with tears … asheartbreak … touched every land’ (45). For the Mirror, too, the death ofDiana is not just a national but a global affair: a headline reads: ‘World ofsorrow – countries unite to mourn princess’ (46). This world that one readsof here is, of course, a world that has Britain at its centre. Thus the tabloidshave a chance briefly to resurrect an image of Britain as an all-important,leading nation; even, perhaps, to pretend just for a moment that that therehas been no sad decline in Britain’s power and influence.
But perhaps the most striking aspect of the coverage of Diana’s death isthe way in which here, yet again, the papers take up the challenge of defyingan out-of-touch elite on behalf of the ordinary British people. In this case,the out-of-touch elite are none other than the members of the Royal Family:the Queen, in particular, is condemned for not speaking of her sorrow to thepublic. On this matter, the indignation of the Sun knows no bounds:
As Britain unashamedly pours out its grief for Diana, the RoyalFamily remains aloof … There has been no expression of sorrow fromthe Queen on behalf of the nation. Not one word has come from aroyal lip, not one tear has been shed in public from a royal eye (47).
The Mail wants to know: ‘Why can’t the Royal Family show their grief?’(48); and a Mirror front page is given over to a simple demand: ‘Yourpeople are suffering – speak to us Ma’am’(49). This paper’s editorialelaborates: ‘The people of Britain are suffering grievously … We need ourpain to be soothed. And there is one person who should be helping to dothat. The Queen’ (50).
The Monarchy did in fact subsequently bow to the media pressure, andthe Queen addressed the nation on the matter of Diana’s death; also theunprecedented step was taken of flying the Buckingham Palace flag at half
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mast. As far as the Sun is concerned, these measures are ‘too little, too late’(51). But the Mirror expresses its satisfaction with what has been achieved– thanks in part, it claims, to its own capacity give a voice to the will of thenation:
The people spoke and the Queen has answered them. Yesterday’sMirror front page reflected the overwhelming popular feeling in thecountry. The nation wanted the royals to react to the death of Diana aspowerfully as the rest of us. Yesterday they did (52).
Conclusion
It has been argued above that the process of ‘agenda-setting’ manifest in thetabloid discourse of nationhood has three essential dimensions. First, theexistence of the nation, and the meaningfulness of the concept ofnationhood, are taken for granted; secondly, the nation is presented as anentity which responds in an emotional way to issues and events; thirdly,readers are called upon to share these emotional responses, or to react withparticular emotions to the nation itself.
However, an examination of the specific contents of the discourseimmediately reveals that far from being a self-evident, taken-for-grantedreality, the concept of the Anglo-British nation is in fact contested andhighly ambiguous. To start with, there is the question of where theparameters of the nation lie: sometimes the nation is Britain, sometimesEngland, sometimes perhaps the United Kingdom, and sometimes any or allof these.
Moreover, while the tabloid journalists are ever-ready to define thecharacteristics of this nation (whatever nation it is, precisely), thesedefinitions are in fact contradictory and slippery. Readers who take theexhortations of the tabloids seriously might feel constantly torn between animmense sense of pride in the nation, and a feeling of deep shame. The verybest and very worst of the nation are, on occasion, explicitly and starklycontrasted – as in the account of the ‘heroes and villains of Englandfootball’ (namely, the England players and English hooligans) (53) duringthe 1998 World Cup.
Elsewhere, shame follows swiftly on the tail of pride, or vice versa. Forexample, England footballers who engage in drunken misbehaviour oneday, soon redeem themselves with sparkling performances on the field. Orreaders might learn that Britain is best when it comes to some aspects oflife; and worst when it comes to others. In an issue of the Mirror muchconcerned with the controversy over the Manchester United football team’swithdrawal from the FA Cup, one article announces that ‘United are the
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world’s greatest football club. The FA Cup is the world’s greatestcompetition’ (19). But, on a later page, the following unhappy headlineappears: ‘Sickest kids in Europe – Britain’s health scandal’. In this article,one reads that ‘Britain has Europe’s unhealthiest children – with the numberof dangerously underweight babies on a par with Albania’ (54).
Pride in the nation is, thus, rarely unequivocal. Rather, pride inevitablygoes hand-in-hand with defiance: defiance, that is, of the efforts offoreigners, or the liberal and/or corrupt British elites, or the English ‘yobs’,or whoever, to undermine all that is best about the nation. Indeed, itsometimes seems that the very movement of history, no less, must be defied.A profound fear of change is apparent in much of the tabloid discourse ofnationhood – from which one learns that the more positive aspects ofnational life are those that are located, or at least firmly rooted, in the past.15
(Whether that past is the era of the British Empire; or that more recent timewhen modest, overwhelmingly nice young Englishmen won the footballWorld Cup.) Hence the palpable sense of fragility in Paul Johnson’saccount, in the Daily Mail, of the good things about the British way of life:
Drinking draught ale in a pewter tankard … in an old country inn,which has the sense to put out wooden trestles in the warm sunshine… Sitting by the Round Pond, Kensington Gardens, on a Sundaymorning. Church bells ringing. Small boys with little motor boats andold gents sailing their full-rigged yachts, miracles of craftsmanship.Ladies feeding the wildfowl. Nothing exciting or exotic or luxurious.Just very British (55).
Over and above the contradictions and uncertainties within the tabloiddiscourse of nationhood, there is, of course, a broader contradiction. Asnoted above, the tabloids’ unquestioning acceptance of the concept of thenation and its great significance to their readers contrasts sharply with thecurrent questioning and problematising of this concept within other kinds ofpublic discourse. Thus the tabloids appear to be adopting a special role indefending not only the virtues of the Anglo-British nation but also the verynotion of nationhood. This is suggested by the emotional intensity andexaggeration of the tabloid talk of the nation, as well as by the vigour withwhich the papers claim to be giving a voice to ‘the people’ – who, forexample, want the Royals to mourn properly for Diana; insist on saying ‘no’to the Euro; will not allow the FA Cup to be ruined; and are able toappreciate the proud history of Britain regardless of what the cynics have tosay about it.
In conclusion, it can be argued that the analysis of the tabloid Pressdiscourse of nationhood presented in this paper indicates that to ask thequestion ‘When is the nation?’ or ‘When does a nation come into
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existence?’ is to fail to recognise the shifting, multi-dimensional characterof nationhood. The concept of nationhood can, evidently, be articulated in arange of different and often contradictory ways within and betweendifferent sectors of society. In the effort to understand the evolution of agiven nation, it may therefore be more productive to examine and comparethe ways in which meaning is ascribed to nationhood within differenthistorical periods, rather than to try to identify a stage in history in whichthe nation might be said to have come into being. The contents of this articleshould aid an understanding of the some of the conceptions of Anglo-Britishnationhood that have widespread influence within contemporary Britishsociety.
NOTES
1. W.A. Gamson and K.E. Lasch, ‘The Political Culture of Social Welfare Policy’, in S.E.Spiro and E. Yuchtmann-Yaar (eds), Evaluating the Welfare State (New York: AcademicPress 1983); W.A. Gamson and A. Modigliani, ‘Media Discourse and Public Opinion onNuclear Power’, American Journal of Sociology 95/1 (1989) pp.1–37; D.A. Snow and R.D.Benford, ‘Ideology, Frame Resonance and Participant Mobilization’, International SocialMovement Research 1 (1988) pp.197–217; D.A. Snow and R.D. Benford, ‘Master Framesand Cycles of Protest’ and S. Tarrow, ‘Mentalities, Political Culture and Collective ActionFrames: Constructing Meanings Through Action’, in A.D. Morris and C. McClurg-Mueller(eds), Frontiers in Social Movement Theory (New Haven, CN: Yale University Press 1992).
2. For an overview, see: M.L. Fleur and S. Ball-Rokeach, Theories of Mass Communication(New York: Longman 1982).
3. E Shaw, ‘Agenda-setting and Mass Communication Theory’, International Journal forMass Communication Studies xxv/2 (1979) pp.96–105.
4. J.R. Gusfield, The Culture of Public Problems: Drinking-driving and the Symbolic Order(Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1981).
5. B. Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism(rev. edn, London: Verso 1991).
6. It should be noted that in Scotland, the newspapers that are the focus of this study – the Sun,Mirror and Daily Mail – do not have the same high profile that they do in England, althoughthey do have Scottish editions. Among the Scottish papers, the left-leaning tabloid the DailyRecord has, at approximately 600,000, by far the greatest circulation (Audit Bureau ofCirculations; August 2000 to Jan 2001).
7. P. Dodd, The Battle over Britain (London: Demos 1995).8. H Seton-Watson, Nations and States: An Enquiry into the Origins of nations and the Politics
of Nationalism (London: Methuen 1977).9. Recent publications which reflect on English/British national identity include, for example:
S. Haseler, The English Tribe: Identity, Nation and Europe (Basingstoke: Macmillan 1996);S Heffer, Nor Shall My Sword: The Reinvention of England (London: Weidenfeld andNicolson 1999); J. Paxman, The English: A Portrait of a People (London: Penguin 1999);A. Marr, The Day Britain Died (London: Profile 2000); T. Nairn After Britain? (London:Granta 2000)
10. Circulation figures from the Audit Bureau of Circulations; based on period of August 2000to January 2001.
11. Figures in parentheses refer to appended list of cited newspaper articles.12. W. MacPherson The Stephen Lawrence Inquiry: Report of an Inquiry by Sir William
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MacPherson of Cluny (London: The Stationery Office 1999)13. In fact, the Mirror’s stance provoked a number of complaints, and, ultimately, an apology
from its editor; meanwhile, the Sun distanced itself from what it described as the‘xenophobia’ of its rival. For an account of the Press coverage of Euro 96 see: J. Garlandand M. Rowe ‘War Minus the Shooting? Jingoism, the English Press and Euro 96’, Studiesin Crime, Disorder and Policing Research Paper No. 7 (Leicester: University of LeicesterScarman Centre 1997).
14. It is interesting to note that Manchester United did ultimately play in the Braziliancompetition, despite the Mirror’s protestations, and were knocked out in the first round.
15. For more on Britain’s problematic relationship with the past, as this is conveyed in theBritish Press, see: J. Jacobson, ‘Britain and Europe: Images of the Nation and Integration inthe British Press’, European Institute Working Paper (London: LSE 1997).
Newspaper articles cited
(1) Mirror 25 February 1999, ‘Damning verdict that shames the nation’(2) Sun 1 March 1999, ‘Britain backs our bobbies’(3) Sun 23 July 1998, ‘Drugs shame’(4) Sun 11 June 1998 ‘All at sea’(5) Daily Mail 4 June 1999, ‘Our elite forces will lead the way’(6) Daily Mail 10 June 1999, ‘Let’s get on with the job – crack British troops spearhead Nato
March into Kosovo’(7) Daily Mail 10 June 1999, ‘We’ll do the dirty work say the British’(8) Daily Mail 12 June 1999, ‘Peace dawns at last as the paras go in’(9) Daily Mail 12 June 1999, ‘Put peace on hold, for the US to grab all the glory’(10) Daily Mail 28 September 1999, ‘Foreign judges and Britain’s defence’(11) Daily Mail 6 June 1998, ‘Whatever happened to all the heroes?’(12) Sun 31 May 1996, ‘On the brawl’(13) Daily Mail 6 June 1998, ‘So why are they letting us all down so badly?’(14) Mirror 16 June 1998, ‘Tough on crime, Prime Minister?’(15) Mirror 2 July 1998, ‘A tale of two Englishmen’(16) Sun 24 June 1996, ‘Let’s blitz Fritz’(17) Mirror 24 June 1996, ‘Achtung surrender … for you, Fritz, ze Euro 96 championships are
over’(18) Mirror 24 June 1996, ‘Mirror declares war on Germany’(19) Mirror 1 July 1999, ‘Hang your heads – Man United chiefs are accused of treachery’(20) Mirror 1 July 1999, ‘Stop them from wrecking the FA Cup and betraying every single
football fan in this country’(21) Mirror 2 July 1999, ‘Sir Alex must save us from these traitors’(22) Daily Mail 6 April 1996, ‘Will Brussels turn our farmers into outlaws?’(23) Sun 24 June 1998, ‘Is THIS the most dangerous man in Britain?’(24) Sun 25 June 1998, ‘People’s voice will be heard’(25) Daily Mail 6 June 1998, ‘This ugly insult to Britain’s past’(26) Sun 28 June 1996, ‘Pride of lions – even the BBC can’t ignore England’s patron saint now’(27) Daily Mail 5 June 1999, ‘Churchill? Who’s he? The under 30s who don’t know if we won
the war’(28) Daily Mail 7 June 1999, ‘As British Airways brings back the Union Jack – 20 more reasons
to fly the flag’(29) Daily Mail 14 March 1996, ‘The whole nation is appalled says Queen’(30) Daily Mail 14 March 1996, ‘The Dunblane massacre – the grief we all share’(31) Sun 14 March 1996, ‘A nation weeps’(32) Sun 14 March 1996, ‘We weep for little ones’(33) Sun 15 March 1996, ‘Share the grief of 16 mothers’(34) Sun 18 March 1996, ‘Glimmer of hope in the darkness’(35) Daily Mail 18 March 1996, ‘The grief of Dunblane – nation at a standstill as vicar strives
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for the words to sum up an unspeakable tragedy’(36) Times 18 March 1996, ‘The Queen leads day of mourning’(37) Sun 1 September 1997, ‘Goodnight our sweet Princess’(38) Mirror 3 September 1997, ‘A nation united in grief – from punks to pensioners they came
to say goodbye’(39) Daily Mail 3 September 1997, ‘How Diana has truly united our kingdom’(40) Sun 2 September 1997, ‘A funeral for the people’(41) Mirror 2 September 1997, ‘A people’s funeral for the people’s princess’(42) Daily Mail 3 September 1997, ‘Day the nation will stand still’(43) Mirror 2 September 1997, ‘Be silent all Britain’(44) Sun 3 September 1997, ‘One minute’s hush all over the world’(45) Sun 2 September 1997, ‘The world weeps – tributes and tears as nations mourn Di’(46) Mirror 2 September 1997, ‘World of sorrow – countries unite to mourn princess’(47) Sun 3 September 1997, ‘The Sun speaks its mind: show us there’s a heart in the House of
Windsor’(48) Daily Mail 4 September 1997, ‘Why can’t the Royal Family show their grief?’(49) Mirror 4 September 1997, ‘Your people are suffering – speak to us Ma’am’(50) Mirror 4 September 1997, ‘Your people have spoken … now YOU must, Ma’am’(51) Sun 5 September 1997, ‘106 hours … then finally Queen does the decent thing on flag –
Tribute too late, says nation’(52) Mirror 5 September 1997, ‘Comfort for the nation’(53) Sun 16 September 1998, ‘Heroes and villains of English football’(54) Mirror 1 July 1999, ‘Sickest kids in Europe – Britain’s health scandal’(55) Daily Mail 30 March 1996, ‘Despair not – there’s much that is still great about our country’
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