Olivia Hoernschemeyer
 

In my first reflection paper on what my perceptions of what it means to be “British” mostly revolved around British pop culture such as TV shows, singers, and the Royal Family, but since studying and traveling around Great Britain for the past 2 weeks I’ve learned so much more about what it means to be “British”. 

From traveling on the tube and walking around the city I’ve found that British people are pretty reserved and very non-confrontational. On the tube I’ve noticed that when homeless people are walking up and down the aisle of the cars asking for money, British people tend to look at the ground and don’t say anything. While on an American train Americans usually give a direct answer, usually no, when asked for money.  Another thing I’ve noted about their non-confrontational personalties is that if someone is blocking their way they don’t ask them to move, but rather just kind of push their way past them. But I’ve also seen how kind British people can be. While riding the tube there have been several times where British men have offered me their seat because I was standing. They are also always willing to help with directions or suggest a local spot to try that I probably wouldn’t find on my own. I also noticed that all the countries that belong in the UK aren’t always happy with one another. When we traveled to Edinburgh I was surprised to learn how much Scotland wanted to leave the UK and become an independent nation. I was surprised by this because in the US it always seems that the UK has a united front, but it just goes to show that no country has it perfect and everyone has their own problems they are fighting with. The biggest problems I noticed overall in the UK were Brexit and keeping all 4 nations that are a part of the UK happy. 

In America, nationalism and a strong sense of pride is often seen across the nation. You can’t drive down a street in the U.S. without seeing a flag somewhere, but while being in London I’ve only seen the flags displayed on top of government buildings or other important buildings relating to the country. British people still have a sense of pride for their country, but it is no where near as strong as the pride that Americans have for the USA. Londoners and British people in general are much more aware of the mistakes their country has made in the past, and are even working to bring more awareness to these mistakes. While in America, we sometimes aren't as honest about our past as we should be, and for the parts of the past that we do talk about it is often sugarcoated. Americans do this because they have such a strong sense of national pride, and they don't want to show anything that will make the United States look bad. I’m not saying it’s bad to have a strong sense of national pride, but it is also important to recognize the mistakes made in the past and work to tell the whole truth, and not just the parts we want the world to see.  Americans can learn from the British in that way of being more open about your country’s past. In America, the darkest part of our past is obviously slavery. Slavery is acknowledged as a terrible part of our past, but there are still many people who don't want to dive that deep into slavery because they see it as severely tarnishing America's reputation of being inclusive to everyone and being the land where anything is possible. But it's important to also pay as much attention to the bad as you do with good because you are able to learn from the past, and make sure nothing like that happens again.

Finally, something that I’ve really picked up on since being in London and visiting Edinburgh is how diverse both cities are. Before coming here when I thought of Great Britain I mostly just thought it was predominantly white. I obviously knew there was diversity here, but I was amazed to see how diverse both cities are, especially London. Since learning more about Great Britain’s history it makes sense for how diverse it would be. During its time as a top world power Great Britain had colonies all across the world, and people in these colonies would sometimes immigrate to Great Britain which led to an increase in their diversity in their population, such as the Indian and Bangladeshi populations our class encountered in the East End.