Am I British or English? A Question I Never Really Thought About

For most of my life, I never gave much thought to whether I was British or English. I never thought I had to.

I was born in England. I grew up in England. I went to school in England. I supported England when football tournaments came around. I drank tea, complained about the weather, queued patiently and considered myself, without question, English.

Yet whenever I travelled abroad and someone asked where I was from or I needed to fill in a form, I would usually answer, "I'm British."

The two terms were interchangeable in my mind. They described the same person.

Or so I thought.

It wasn't until later in life that I realised how unusual the United Kingdom is when it comes to identity.

If someone is from Bangladesh, they are Bangladeshi. If they are from Sweden, they are Swedish. The nationality and the country are one and the same.

But in the United Kingdom, things are different.

I am English because I come from England.

I am British because England is part of Great Britain.

At the same time, someone from Scotland can be Scottish and British. Someone from Wales can be Welsh and British. Someone from Northern Ireland may identify as British, Irish, or both.

To outsiders this can seem incredibly confusing.

To be honest, it is confusing to us as well.

Growing up, I never had to think about it. My identity was simply part of who I was. England was home. Britain was my country. Both felt true.

Then life became more interesting.

I was asked to represent England in a Four Nations tournament running in a Backyard Ultra competition. A Backyard Ultra, otherwise known as a BYU, is where you run a 6.7km lap every hour on the hour until the last person is standing. The first time I joined one of these ‘races’, if you can call it a race, was in May 2024 and I found it utterly fascinating how you can run a race with hundreds of other people and yet not one of them feels like a competitor.

The goal of the BYU is to be the last person standing so you don’t get the term DNF after your name – Did Not Finish. It feels so different to a normal competitive race – it’s a warm, friendly place and the pace you run at means talking, chatting, making new friends is part of the event. In fact I find talking one of the tools to help me go longer in this race as it helps lift my mood.

Now back to whether I’m British or English – both or neither?

I moved abroad. I travelled more. I met people from different cultures. I eventually also became a Swedish citizen – so now I’m dual British and Swedish (don’t get me started on that!).

For the first time since getting my Swedish citizenship, I found myself thinking more deeply about what nationality actually means.

I am being asked to run in a competition and beat my fellow countrymen and women – the Scots, the Irish and the Welsh. But surely they are part of my country? Do I feel English enough to really want to beat these nations I am being told are not part of my identity? Or does it feel strange that I am being asked to run further than my home people?

It doesn’t feel very British to be trying to beat the Scots, Irish and the Welsh but it is what an English person would do...

What I have found out about a BYU and life in general is that it helps you to be a stronger person individually if you help others. My number one goal for tomorrow is to help the England team win. I believe with the camaraderie under the team captaincy of Becky we are already winners and I predict we’ll be winning the tournament before it starts. I’ll be helping to push my English team to new PBs and hopefully a convincing win but I won’t be looking at the Scots, the Irish, the Welsh as the enemy. They will be fellow countrymen and women that will be taking the hard long road of a BYU with me and we all deserve as much support from the UK public as possible. Let’s support everybody to go as far as they can!

Tomorrow when I am standing on the start line at Florence Court, Northern Ireland I’ll be standing with my fellow country people and we’ll have one hell of a ride!

Whilst trying to find out who I am what I've learned is that identity isn't a box you tick once and never revisit.

It evolves.

I am increasingly influenced by the world I live in and the interactions I make. And perhaps that's the reality for many people in an increasingly connected world. Identity isn't always one thing. It can be layered. You can belong to more than one place.

You can be proud of where you came from while embracing where you are today.

And maybe that's not confusing at all. Maybe that's simply what it means to be human.