(from The Guardian 17 August, 2009.)

The legacy of the Allan Wells ’80s still affects a staff writer at The Guardian. Back then, many Scots were disappointed at the media representation of Wells as British when winning and Scottish when losing. Positive discrimination is evident in this paragraph;

When the set reached 6-6, Del Potro called for the trainer to get some treatment on his shoulder, but he was able to continue. But he made a crucial error in the second tie break of the match to allow the Scot to take the lead 4-2. Murray then endured a barrage of Del Potro forehands, as the Argentine attacked the second serve. But the Scot held on to his advantage and won the tie break 7-3 to level the match.

To most readers, there would be no jarring in the flow of the text. As an experimental juxtaposition, how does the following flow, after substituting Murray for a fictitious English Jenkins?

When the set reached 6-6, Del Potro called for the trainer to get some treatment on his shoulder, but he was able to continue. But he made a crucial error in the second tie break of the match to allow the Englishman to take the lead 4-2. Jenkins then endured a barrage of Del Potro forehands, as the Argentine attacked the second serve. But the Englishman held on to his advantage and won the tie break 7-3 to level the match.

We do not read this kind of text in the England-based press. In an ‘English’ paper that purports to serve England, there can be no call of foul, but in papers that conflate Britishness and Englishness, the deliberate statement of separation only confuses the writer’s actual sentiments regarding the nationality issue.

When The Scotsman does the same thing

Murray served for the set at 5-3 but was unable to get the job done as Tsonga hit back to frustrate the Scot

the context of The Scotsman delivers a jingoistic and insecure message. Scottishness needs to be reinforced. But in The Guardian’s case, we are left with a choice: is ‘the Scot’ merely an acceptable synonym for Murray seeing as the Scots themselves seem to use it as such, or is it a device for marking out differences?

(from The Guardian 12 July, 2009.)

More than a third of children spend less than an hour outside each day as Britain’s youngsters miss out on the experiences of previous generations

Running and playing games in a garden or park is the country’s favourite children’s pastime, the National Trust claims

The National Trust is a stange name for an organisation that claims to be British but does not cover Scotland. Their page asks viewers to “Click on your region or country of the UK” to find NT services close to them. Wales and N Ireland are included, but Scotland is greyed out as is Ireland. No note explains this omission. The FAQ page points to a list of “countries with reciprocal visiting arrangements” with Scotland heading the list.

The status, then, of the term ‘national’ and ‘British’ in the Guardian’s article needs clarification. How many readers will not be aware that the NT does not cover Scotland, or that Scotland has its own, independent National Trust? How many readers will question the status of ‘national’? If it refers to ‘Britain’, what is the ‘National’ in Scotland’s trust? The ‘British’ trust defines their operations as

We work to preserve and protect the buildings, countryside and coastline of England, Wales and Northern Ireland

Referents to national identities are studiously avoided throughout the defining statements by their president, Prince Charles, and the Director-General, Dame Fiona Reynolds. In their place, ‘England, Wales and Northern Ireland are written out in full. At the highest levels of the NT at least, the consciousness of the national identities is strong and accuracy is maintained. However, once we look at the deeper levels, for example the NT online shop, we see the term ‘Britain’ used liberally once more. As the shop presents perhaps the most direct public face of the NT, I would demand as similar avoidance of ‘Britain’ here, too.

Whereas it is semantically true that the NT’s survey as reported in the Guardian happened in Britain, it is clear that the figures are not. The 38% of children becomes only 34% when Scotland is removed. Similarly, the 87% of parents is only 78%. To assume that these figures cover all of Britain shows an ignorance of the make-up of Britain at best and a deliberate and racist dismissal of Scotland at worst.

(from http://news.bbc.co.uk/ 7 July, 2009.)

Those north-of-the-Border Scots interested in the debate over the right to assist in or choose one’s own assisted suicide may have their interest piqued when reading the Telelgraph’s headline. They would remember the latest attempts in the Scottish courts when Debbie Purdie’s 2009 appeal and Jeremy Purvis’s 2005 private member’s bill failed. However, the Telegraph’s inclusionary ‘Britons’ is soon rectified when they clarify that the

amendment to the Coroners and Justice Bill would be a “slippery slope” towards the legalisation of assisted suicide in England and Wales

No such qualification is given in The Independent, The BBC, The Mail, The Times, or The Guardian, although all cited articles bandy the terms ‘UK’ and ‘Britons’ around freely. The Mail offers this

The last time the Lords voted on assisted suicide, over Lord Joffe’s private member’s bill three years ago, the proposal was heavily defeated

Perhaps not an untruth, but certainly in light of the Purdie case, the subtext of ‘there has not been a challenge to an assisted suicide bill in the UK for three years’ is clearly wrong – only the geopolitical scope of the challenge is outside of the Anglo-centric worldview.

At the time of writing this [July 8, 02:42] neither The Scotsman nor The Herald had posted any coverage of this story. A search of their databases using ‘assisted suicide’ revealed that they had not covered the history of the attempt to change the English/ Welsh bill either.

As I wrote about education in Expelling 7-year-olds, the ‘England-as-Britain’ trope also has a relevancy in law. It is well-known that Scottish law is separate from English law, but what is much more difficult for the layman to understand is the degree to which the two systems are linked. The Bill in question here is the Coroners and Justice Bill.

The Bill states explicitly that it deals with judicial matters in England and Wales;

160 Extent
(1) Subject to the following provisions of this section and any other provision of
this Act, this Act extends to England and Wales only.

The ‘provisions’ listed outline criteria for the armed forces and other scenarios where there is connectivity between constituent parts of the UK.

A variant of the ‘England-as-Britain’ trope is the ‘hidden England-as-Britain’. The Viagra story showed this clearly: legislation relevant only to England passed off as affecting the whole of the UK. Whenever the extent of a limited survey, law, or policy is not clarified, the existence of Scotland (or N. Ireland/ Wales) is ignored. It should go without saying that this is unforgivable, but the irony of not saying so would be lost on those not expecting to hear it.

However hidden Scotland is in Britain in these stories, the fact that England is in Britain serves to complicate the semantics in statements such as:

At least 115 people from the UK have gone to Swiss clinic Dignitas to die [BBC]

But at least 100 Britons have travelled to the Dignitas clinic in Zurich to die [Mail]

Debating the issue, Lord Falconer told peers that 115 people had travelled from Britain to Switzerland for help to commit suicide [Times]

Of these ‘British’ people, how many are from England or elsewhere? The articles focus on a change to English law, and there is a similar prohibition in Scottish law against assisted suicide. It is justifiable to believe that the numbers represent departures from all parts of the UK. Yet the current articles in question deal with (albeit hidden) English law. It may well be that 85% of these 115 people were English as England has 85% of the UK population. Or it may be different. Without full disclosure, there is no way of knowing, which subsequently reduces the veracity of the articles.

If things happen in England, it should be reported as such. It may be that the English are hypersensitive to their own national scope and are (mistakenly) inclusive, or it may be that they simply see the word ‘Britain’ as a referent to them and do not really care about the other 15% tagged on. I suspect the latter. Whichever version is true, both serve to minimise Scotland’s input in the Union, and I would argue that both serve to undermine the integrity of what is England.

(from http://news.bbc.co.uk/ 24 June, 2009.)

Not being a tennis buff, I was not aware of any dispute over Elena Baltacha’s nationality. Instead, the BBC’s unbalanced treatment in presenting Andy Murray’s despair at the quality of British tennis talent first drew my attention to a possible identity war over Baltacha. The Beeb define Murray as “Scot Murray, 22, seeded. . . ” but Baltacha is “from north London”.

Actually, she is not. Her current residence is Enfield, but she is from a number of places starting with Kiev, Ipswich and Perth. By the BBC’s logic, Murray should be “Andy Murray from London”. (from Andy Murray’s official website) No one is fighting over Murray, and the BBC’s error only points to their lack of research based on Anglo-centric assumptions.

With Baltacha, it is different. The Herald headlines their article with “Scots duo” referring to Baltacha and Murray. In Tearful Baltacha leads the way, The Scotsman claims her for Scotland, “[i]t was Scotland’s Elena Baltacha who captured the imagination of the Wimbledon crowd”. The Scottish argument is strengthened in the Lawn Tennis Association‘s profile page for Baltacha, where her country is listed as Scotland. The International Tennis Federation and Wimbledon’s own page only mention her Great Britain/ United Kingdom affiliation. Wimbledon’s player profile pages are hardly reliable as English players are listed variously as ‘Great Britain’, ‘England’, or with no listing at all.

Baltacha, herself, does not commit to a unique allegiance to any Home Country in a 2003 Guardian interview.

Born in Kiev, raised in Ipswich and Perth, does she feel Ukrainian, English or Scottish? ‘I feel so this and that and everything mixed together. Just a mix. But it’s lovely because everywhere we’ve been living and staying, we’ve always felt very welcome.’ And she’s happy to represent Britain? ‘Yes, I play for the British flag – I definitely play for the Union Jack.’

Personally, I will not promote the Scottish position as I do not know enough about Baltacha. I would, however, argue for consistency in reporting without bias. Neither are conspicuously present in much of the current coverage of Wimbledon and entirely lacking when discussion Baltacha.

(from The Times 24 June, 2009.)

Nothing in this Times article overtly points to a location. Readers must then take their clues from the wider context of who published the article. The publishers are based in England, as printed at the bottom of each of their webpages;

This website is published by a member of the News International Group. News International Limited, 1 Virginia St, London E98 1XY, is the holding company for the News International group and is registered in England

However, rather than address their content to an English audience, The Times uses ‘Britain’ as its standard term for all things UK, as is customary with all of the ‘national’ UK newspapers. The ‘schools’ and ‘local authorities’ in the report are, then, presumed to be British.

The problem with a news article like this is that the primary source is Ofsted, an education authority that only covers England. The other home countries in the UK have their own education departments. News that is presented as British but is in fact only English is a serious misrepresentation of England’s role in the UK and the reporters are guilty of promoting an Anglo-centric view where other member countries in the UK have no right to a voice.

The BBC in covering the same topic, added just two words to their report: “in England”. Not only does this support the journalistic integrity of the article, it avoids condemning entire nations to an invisible status.

(from http://news.bbc.co.uk/ 23 June, 2009.)

Peter Tobin, 62, from Renfrewshire, in Scotland,

Dinah McNicol, of Tillingham, Essex

he had lived in Irvine Drive in Margate, Kent

he abducted Miss Hamilton in Bathgate, near Edinburgh

Miss McNicol had disappeared after attending a music festival at Liphook, Hampshire

What exactly is the status of ‘Renfrewshire’ in the above citations? Is it a town like the other first-placed area names? Well, the suffix ‘shire’ eliminates that option. We know from the lexical meaning of ‘shire’ that it must be a region identifier beyond the scope of a town/ city. However precise the writer was in locating the other town/ city names, Tobin’s home town/ city name is missing. Tobin has, unfortunately, been in the news before, and we know that he is from Johnstone. A quick check by the journalist would have uncovered that information. One assumption might be that both ‘Johnstone’ and ‘Renfrewshire’ are too unknown to English readers that the author chose to rephrase the location in more Anglo-centric friendly terms.

And what about ‘Scotland’? It comes second, mirroring the use of ‘Essex’, ‘Kent’, ‘Edinburgh’ and ‘Hampshire’. Is ‘Scotland’ a region on the same par as, say, ‘Essex’? Clearly it cannot be level with ‘Edinburgh’, and the reader is left totally confused as to the writer’s system of location categorisation.

The presentation of place names should be a simple matter. First comes the town name then the region. If Britain is supposed to be a single county, then following this simple algorithm should not be so difficult. The major difficulty will be in selecting a version of ‘region’.

Deciding on definition of ‘region’ is not that easy to pin down. Should a writer use the UK government’s criterion of nine areas for English regions, the local authority, councils, county, burgh, or any other idiosyncratic categorisation? There are nine regions in England according to the UK Government, but the number of English boroughs and councils is far higher. Scotland has thirty-two unitary authorities, and until 1996, had nine major regions, whose names are still used colloquially today.

The Telegraph maintains uniformity in town name – region nomenclature choosing the Scottish authority region, even if the implication that Scottish authorities are a part of Britain runs entirely contrary to their erstwhile usage of ‘England-as-Britain’. (See Viagra not getting it up in Scotland.)

Tobin, of Johnstone, Renfrewshire, denies murdering Miss McNicol.

Ultimately though, portraying Scotland on a par with, say, the West Midlands or Essex and naming of Scotland as a region of Britain is both Anglo-centric and inaccurate. It is also deeply insulting.

(from The Telegraph 18 June, 2009.)

A highly worrying trait in incomplete journalism can be seen in the article from The Telegraph. This trope succeeds in overcoming the ‘England-as-Britain’ trope at face value by ignoring any reference to labels or information within Britain (but outside England) which is important to the article. Hidden ‘England-as-Britain’, through carefulness or carelessness, presents the article content blithely without using any potentially inappropriate terminology. The Telegraph begins by declaring that Viagra can be purchased countrywide:

pharmacists at Boots stores across the country will offer men a half-hour consultation to assess the problem and offer a course of the prescription-only drugs.
(Italics mine)

Most readers will pass this by without a second glance. ‘Britain’ and ‘England’ and the ‘country’ are so synonymous as to render any further thought merely a distraction. Beyond an reference to a generic British male, “Erectile dysfunction affects one in 10 British men” tagged on at the end of the article, no location limiting lexis lets readers know that the information in the article refers only to England. These days ‘England’ is far less common than ‘Britain’, even when accuracy requires ‘England’ be used. As is, the article appears complete. The completeness of the article would never be questioned unless other information was known.

A day later, The Herald reports,

It is arguably the most notable cross-border health difference to date between Scotland and England. Viagra is being sold in high street stores from today, but Scots will have to drive to Newcastle if they want to buy the drug over the counter.

(from Viagra sold over the counter … but not in Scotland June 19, 2009.)

The most insidious and destructive instances of ‘England-as-Britain’ are when no location identifier is printed at all in the news article and additional knowledge needed to complete the article’s accuracy is omitted. In its place are generic labels, such as ‘country’, ‘state’, and ‘nation’. These are empty discourse declarations requiring definitions before they have meaning. What makes this variant on the trope so destructive is that it appears innocuous but actually hides the existence of any non-English British state entirely.

(from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/ 22 June, 2009.)

Maths and science exams taken by students in China are more “interesting and demanding” than their British GCSE counterparts

This sub-heading is confused. The writer used the word ‘British’ either to avoid the wordy ‘English and Welsh counterparts’ or to blanket the whole of the Britain with a system only found in some parts. If ‘GCSE’ had been left out, an astute reader would have questioned if all UK education systems had been compared to the Chinese one. Including ‘GCSE’ limits the comparison to the English (& Welsh) system. Hardly all-encompassing British.

The Royal Society of Chemistry’s stated purpose was to help gather data “to ensure the country has the right skills for the future”. Which ‘country’ is being referred to here, I wonder? My question is answered soon:

The Chinese exam papers in chemistry and maths were taken last year by pupils studying at the same level as England’s GCSE students
(Italics mine)

If there should be any doubt of the existence of the ‘England-as-Britain’ trope, the Telegraph’s use of the terms should put that to bed immediately. Altogether, there are three iterations of ‘English/ England’ and two of ‘Britain’ all used synonymously. The sub-text of this Telegraph article is that the English education system IS the British one.

Education in the United Kingdom is a devolved matter with each of the countries of the United Kingdom having separate systems under separate governments: the UK Government is responsible for education in England, the Scottish Government is responsible for education in Scotland,[1] the Welsh Assembly Government is responsible for education in Wales[2] and the Northern Ireland Executive is responsible for education in Northern Ireland.

Wikipedia does not even begin to address the issue in a single page and immediately refers readers to the relevant separate encyclopedia entries.

As a Scot who worked hard enough to gain four Scottish Highers back in the day, it’s quite galling to (continually) have that system ignored. As a Scot hoping for full independence, the continued separation is a useful seed to plant in preparation for the day that articles like the Telegraph’s one actually has lexical accuracy.

(from http://news.bbc.co.uk/ 21 June, 2009.)

The Arctic island of Greenland is assuming self-rule, in the latest step towards independence from Denmark.

“Self-rule” is defined as: “taking control of the police and the courts”.

Now, the Scottish movement for full independence shares some characteristics with Greenland. Yet, devolution in Scotland is not uniformly equated with steps “towards independence”. Scottish devolution is seen by some as a mechanism for strengthening the Union, not a move towards rejecting it. There are multiple views on the purpose of devolution, and Greenland is not Scotland. But if a reader employs parallel thinking, it could easily be argued that the BBC writer is equating Scotland’s self-rule with her implied movement towards independence.

I don’t think that the BBC staff writer even thought about Scotland, nor was any implication intended to be drawn from the piece. Or maybe it was. The BBC article draws a potentially erronous comparison with Scotland’s position in the Union by claiming that “Denmark has the final say in defence and foreign-policy matters”. This mirrors what Scotland can do in the UK parliament (which, of course, contains Scottish MPs so the parallel is not exact). Yet, New York Times claims that Greenland does actually have “control over . . . to a certain extent, foreign affairs”, which is not the same as Scotland’s ability.

I don’t know which version is correct, but the BBC version echoes the Scottish question whereas the US version does not. Coincidence? Probably not, but the question of worldwide identify at the nation-state level is brought up seriously when the BBC report that:

Greenlanders – most of whom are native Inuit – will be treated as a separate people under international law.

Evidently there are the same types of internal self-doubt in Greenland as in Scotland concerning issues of fiscal governing and the abilities of the politicians themselves, especially over corruption claims:

Corruption in the political system is still a big problem, and this is one of the reasons why some have been worried about cutting the ties with Denmark

The BBC obviously cannot decide on these issues by themselves. However, they need to be much more critical of their position in the UK society when they publish articles that have a direct and powerful correlation here.

(from http://news.bbc.co.uk/ 21 June, 2009.)

My interest is piqued whenever seeing a reference to an ‘England’ only article. Time and time again, the mantra of ‘England as Britain’ rears its ugly head. This time, though, the Beeb were bang on in their reporting of a British Dental Association (BDA) review.

The review only covered England. There were no references to Britain in the article, and the extent of the coverage was clarified;

In Scotland and Northern Ireland, not covered by the changes, the number of complex treatments rose.

The contract also covers Wales, although the review only deals with services in England.

Why the BDA studied England only may be a matter of Anglo-centricism or of practicality. Leaving that issue aside, let’s hold this Beeb article up as an example of professional, accurate reporting.