Talk:Nancy Mitford/Archive 1

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Out of interest

Would someone mind explaining what "very English" means - or better yet, find a cited description that explains what it means? Slac speak up! 02:22, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Now there's a question! . . the term "very English" was used by and of a fairly self-aware "upper-class" minority in England in the first half of C.20th (probably the second quarter, really: perhaps the essentially transitional period from after the Great War until roughly the end-of-empire phase highlighted by the Suez fiasco (1956)) - to describe families, households or individuals and their manners and lifestyle. The relevant classes are probably the aristocracy, the established senior naval and military families and the very top of the church. The term involves a mass of social connotations rather than any identifiable definition . . to be described as "very English" a family had to be Home, rather than Indian or other Colonial (or of course American), and English rather than Scottish or Welsh, socially widely- and/or well-connected, at ease with or even assertive or an established leader in its 'Englishness', and long-established as such. Whether Town or County probably didn't come into it much (though of course a rural minor-gentry family without naval or military connections would probably also lack relevant social connections).

Note that until recently there was a long-established and notoriously value-laden status-system among classes in England, running from the nobility and gentry at the top through military, church and professional classes down through business-owners (ie manufacturers and merchants commanding capital) to the skilled and unskilled settled working classes, tramps and vagrants and the unemployed / unemployable. The concept of class here is in fact economic class (the relationship to the means of wealth-production) and widely-used terms like "upper-class", "lower-class" etc referred to "upper-status class", "lower-status class" etc - but in ordinary usage speakers were not conscious of the economic structure and would identify an individual's class-membership on the basis of her/his dress, speech, manner etc. The status-sequence is most clearly expressed in the well-known general rule for careers in a good family: the eldest son would follow the father in succeeding to the family title(s) and estate(s), the second son would take a commission in the army and the third would go into the church. (Subject to variations, of course; and in particular for Naval families: the role of Naval Officer is something of a profession - as the Duke of Edinburgh notoriously reminds interviewers - and this implied a certain ambiguity of status. This history probably reflects the immense cost of warships, and the role that funding for the Navy played in shaping the Civil War and Commonwealth, so that throughout the modern period the British State has been far from relaxed about the quality of Naval command.)

The stage ("the acting profession") falls among the professions, so that it was probably never correct to describe an actor (or any of the major acting families) as "very English" in the relevant sense. So, for example, Noel Coward was plainly very much an English actor, and in his personal style he might be described as "very English" in the relevant sense, but by family background he clearly was not. Churchill's eccentricity, and particularly his eclectic approach to his army career, suggest a "very English" identity - but his skill and commitment as a communicator suggest otherwise, as does his dedication to service to State and Empire (rather than estate and family); in family terms he seems always to have been very aware of his American mother, and of course his priorities and methods at the peak of his career, as World-War II Prime Minister, heavily reflected his American connections. The Mitford Sisters clearly were "very English", with their aristocratic background, striking politics and fully self-assured and creative eccentricity, and are an interesting case-study; and Nancy Mitford's writings about U and non-U hint at the self-awareness typically involved.

Because the term relates to social rather than political / business role it's easy to think of it as giving prominence to the feminine dimensions of the household's functioning. But the class-identity is fundamental - and relates to the socioeconomic role of the (patriarchally-defined) head-of-household and "his" family: so the concept is sexist.

If anybody wants to respond further to Slac's suggestions, and/or treat this effort as a stub, and to try to work it up and "pot it out" as a referenced article, they're truly welcome . . please ping my talk-page if you're even thinking about it (and I bet you are, if you're still reading!) SquisherDa (talk) 00:18, 9 April 2012 (UTC)