h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Note on Native American tribes - they do indeed calculate blood percentages. Depending on the tribe and the settlements made with the US government, the percentage of native blood you have determines what benefits, if any, you are entitled to. Head rights (usually used to calculate oil/mineral rights royalties) are also based on blood percentages. During initial settlements in the 1800's, some tribe members chose not to list their names on tribal rolls.

Wow, I know that down here blood percentages came into play during mission times in Australia, but these days you're either Aboriginal or you're not as far as government tends to go.

Also, from personal experience, it's insulting when people start going into fractions and percentages...like you're a racehorse or something...I still cringe when people (even with the most harmless intentions) say things like "half caste".

But then I suppose it's all about identity isn't it? Especially if you're coming from a culture rather than a country...

Well, I was in the Cardiff area but it was a long time ago. I might just have been too young to really notice anything special. But still, I would speak of Scotland and Ireland as being British and Wales as being English. Unless there was some big Welsh guy near me.

You'd be wrong, in geographical, historical, political and cultural terms
I presume as a Scandinavian you'd be upset if we lumped you all together just because Denmark once dominated the peninsula

"I would speak of ... Wales as being English"

Don't do it, ok.

Xanatic - you are a bright guy - if every single person in a discussion tells you that you are abusing the language by using the wrong terminology, don't persist in being ignorant.

It IS a matter of terminology as much as anything else, and to say that The Welsh are actually English because they look like it to you, is as inaccurate as saying comets are actually planets because they both circle a sun.

It is a category error. You have been told it is a category error. You have been given reasons which explain *why* it is a category error. If you are this arrogant and willfully stupid in other learning situations, I am not surprised you haven't managed to get yourself into a university.

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*really annoyed about this now*

"I presume as a Scandinavian you'd be upset if we lumped you all together just because Denmark once dominated the peninsula"

"Scandinavian", and indeed "Nordic" are terms more like British, which INCLUDE the constituent countries. I cannot remember the difference between the two terms, I think Nordic includes Finland and Scandinavian doesn't.

This is more like saying that Prussians are Bavarians because you can't tell the difference, or maybe that Denmark is a Baltic state because so far as you are concerned it is on the Baltic sea and therefore it's one of the Baltics.

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*more annoyed about the willful stupidity than about the specific issue*

And you won’t get much love for calling Ireland British; in fact you’re likely to get a much bigger sting than you have for suggesting Wales is English. Wales is not English as has been stated it has it's own very distinct identity in spite of many centuries of Anglicisation of varying degrees of deliberateness.

sorry, didn't explain my point very well
a Norwegian would probably resent it if you classed him as a Dane or Swede just because Norway has spent much of its history ruled by those 2 countries
the 1 thing this thread should have made clear is that cultural identity is a very personal thing and little to do with nationality

Good point. I am woefully ignorant about Scandinavian history. In fact make that European history.

I blame the parents, myself!



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we can get Xanatic to tell us about it whilst we explain Welsh, Scottish and Irish history to him

Do any of you think there is a case for different 'tribes' in Britain? i.e. the English are Anglo-Saxons, the Scots etc. are Goidelaic Celts and the Welsh are Brythons?
personally I think that it is pretty nonsensical after so many centuries; regardless of how much mixing and intermarriage went on, those cultures have gone. That is, someone claiming to be a Celt nowadays would have to show they live in a tribal society based on oral tradition, with a nice line in geometrics. Which they can't, as there aren't any left. Celtic descent perhaps, Celtic culture- non.
Contrast that with modern American Indians or other indigenous peoples who still retain their tribal organisation.
Besides, the Celts came from around Austria way, or at least what is no Europe, so some of them must have developed into the Angles, Saxons and Jutes, right? and are modern Germans etc. Anglo-Saxons too?
Also, bits of Northern France would have to be Celtic as well.
This is not to say, at all, that all constituent countries of Britain are culturally the same. They are obviously not, thank God. I think it would make more sense for them to concentrate on their different modern cultural characteristics, rather than a vague genetic connection which may not actually be true (who can trace their family back that far?), which clings too much to romantic Victorian 'cultic twallette' flannel. IMHO.
as for me I have one possibly Bosnian grandparent who was born in Yugoslavia. My great-grandmother was Canadian and rich, but disowned when she married great-grandfather, who was Romany by way of Ireland. Cool. I don't necessarily 'feel' any of that but it is interesting.

In Britain and along ethnic lines and defined by the original culture associated with the tribe, no.
But the British celtic culture evolved and was supressed in some cases but it hasn't completely died.
The celts weren't a tribe they were a collection of warrior tribes connected by a shared culture.
The Angles, Saxon and Jutes were not part of the celtic culture and they are ethic groups from northern Germany and are still ethnicly distinct from the celtic tribe of central europe including southern Germany.
Breton is northern france still retains it's celtic identity and language.
It's interesting that mention a Bosnian connection because tribal culture still very much exists, blood feuds within the tribes and racial hatred without in the balkans and for that matter most of the world.

Sorry, I meant many tribes- in that if the people now claiming to be Celts organised their society by the same structure that the ancient peoples they claim kinship with did, they would have more of a case.
There were plenty of the Celtic tribes in what is now England also; there was a big ol' slaughter of them not so far from here, apparently. And we still have a large contingent of Druids... I couldn't tell you how close they are to the real thing, though, since they won't play with girls.
The original human mass (best term I can think of) of Europe, I suppose we could term them Caucasians, split off into the different groups. As I understand it- they would have all come from the same group originally? but as they separated they developed different cultures. Hence the Celtic one as distinct from the Teutonic (correct term?) separated by enough time and distance.
That's what my perception is of the modern Celtic areas. They have a different culture to the ancient peoples so cannot be considered the same. I don't have a problem with it being a modern Celtic culture tho (eisteddfodau etc. or less traditional practices unique to those areas) and I have even less time for snotty English provincials stuck up their own backsides terming themselves Anglo-Saxons.
Doesn't the French government have it in somewhat for the Breton language? there's a surprise!

We think he is Bosnian, that's just an informed guess really. That side of the family is somewhat impenetrable.

There are some very interesting points being flung about on this thread, so i thought i'd have my two penneth...

To answer the main point of the thread in the firstplace......i consider myself Northumbrian,(this isnt out of any spite of England, i like England,my missus is English), of course, people would say, well Northumbria is just north east England, which of course it is....officially anyway,and that makes me English, but there is much more to it than that, Northumbria is an ancient Kingdom, not some new fanciful notion,it is older than England or Scotland, and yet more than any other area of England (Cornwall is similar), Northumbria has retained its character and own unique culture,and its own language(which is undergoing a revival), which is where the answer to the question lies, what people tend to consider as their nationality isnt neccesarily just where they were officialy born, its about an identity you feel you belong too, where you feel your ties are, and that is why i do not consider myself Englsh....however...i am from the british isles,which is slightly contradictory on my part as that is for purely geographical reasons, we live on an island called Britain, simple as that, i dont think it stands for a nationality though.....its just a collective name for our respective nations and has no bearing on what and where i consider myself to be from, its all in the mind and what you have been brought up on also.

As mentioned I have been to Scotland, Wales and Ireland. What I was trying to say was that to me I could see the difference between Ireland and Scotland, and mainland England. Whereas with Wales I thought it seemed to me like my idea of what English is like. I could see that they made a lot out of the Welsh language, but other than that it seemed to me to be the same as the rest of Britain. Judging from this thread there is obviously some big divide between Wales and England that I don't understand or know about. I suppose I offended people on here due to my ignorance of that, and I apologize.

Graceful apology Xanatic.

It wasn't your original ignorance that offended people, it was your persistance in adhering to it after some of the differences and the reasons for them had been explained.

In fairness, Swansea is probably one of the most mixed towns in Wales. If you had gone to rural Welsh Wales you would have noticed the difference. It is there in the landscape, in the water, in the air, in the language and in the blood. It is common, for example, for people in a pub to be talking in English, and then to switch to Welsh when a group of unknown English-speaking customers come in.

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Well I'm told I'm half Scottish, 3/8 English and 1/8 Irish... but my Bub is going to be born in Wales

That's cool about Northumbria. I like counties; the differences are quite noticeable in many of them. I like how elements of various histories are preserved; character (by that I mean not some lazy stereotype), dialect etc.
What is the Northumbrian language? is it related to Scots Gaelic at all?
Personally I feel more attached to the area I am from, than England as a whole.

Often your cultural identity is shaped by what distincts you from the rest. I'm a Finn with a Polish father. When I was little I used to go about saying that I'm 'half-Polish'. I wanted to ephasise that because it made me special and just a little bit exotic. But that was just an exaggeration. That half thing is true only in genetics. I can't be very Polish when I've lived in Finland all my life and don't even speak my father's language. Nowadays I consider my self all Finnish with some Polishness on top of that.

The language made my family feel very special, though. Father spoke Polish, children Finnish, mother both, and it felt just so natural.


I've been wondering how Somalis born in Finland see themselves. Everywhere they go they're treated as outsiders. They grow up to function in Finnish society but may always be trated here as intruders. And if they went to Somalia they might find the culture there incredibly alien.

Of course I don't know any Somalis, so I can only guess.

My stepson has no home country, and speaks his only languages (English, French and German) with an accent. I feel desperately sorry for him, because he sounds like an incomer everywhere he goes. On the other hand he has the outsider's detachment everywhere, too.

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