Cultural anthropologist Stuart Hall once theorised about the notion of identity and how it is constructed. His position was dualistic, in that we have both a continuous identity, one that is fixed and rooted in the past like a shared heritage, one which we carry with us throughout our life. We also have a discontinuous identity. The latter is always shifting, morphing, altering, as we change as a person.
In what is sure to be a wholly narcissistic enterprise, I decided to try trace my own. I am mainly fascinated by the idea of my continuous identity. Being, as I am, the child of at least third generation British parents, one would assume that my continuous identity is fairly straightforward; entrenched within the linear doctrine of British history, and most prominently the last 22 years. However, I have recently come to the conclusion that my own continuous identity has many more facets and aspects than that.
Firstly, I am an undeniable, English Heritage/National Trust child. As soon as I was old enough to loosely grasp the concept of 'castle', there was rarely a weekend when me and my protesting little sister were not forcibly dragged to a stately home or famous forest, all in the name of ‘culture’. (Some would say that this makes me hopelessly middle-class, which I suppose is a kind of continuous identity in itself). Even now, when my childhood is sadly in the distant past, I can remember the enchantment of musty old rooms in incomprehensibly huge houses, still and calm, but full of distilled and preserved activity of the past.
And my tiny mind was thoroughly captured by the bloody histories portrayed by numerous castles and once-savage dungeons. I imagined vivid scenes of gore and violence, truly British history of the richest and most bloodthirsty kind. From these visits, I gained a colourful idea of what I was told was my heritage. Although at the time I couldn’t really place why it was mine. Surely, a taller-than average, overly imaginative kid in scruffy trainers couldn’t really have much to do with the aristocracy of the British Empire. No more so than anyone else anyway. I now see that it is precisely this which makes continuous identity so - it is shared. Sadly, I have to admit now that I was always most captivated by the gift shops on these excursions. Because a kid can never have too many oversized pencils or overpriced fudge.
I suppose one could appeal to their ‘class’ in order to make sense of their own continuous identity. I have personally never been much of a believer in class as a concept. It seems a ludicrous notion that every British citizen can be neatly slotted into one of only three social categories. As I said before, I suppose I am what most people would call 'middle-class'. Although as a child, this confused me severely, as both my parents did, always had, and indeed still do, work. Surely then I was working-class? For as long as I can remember also, my parents have been self-employed.
For most of my childhood, this meant both of them working for my dad’s landscaping business, but recently my mum gave up that glamorous life in order to follow her ultimate dream, and opened a craft shop. In a cruel twist of irony, now that my mum is the proud owner of the most archetypically middle-class shop known to man, we have become poorer than ever. But, due to the nature of class nomenclature, that does not change our social status, as class is not so much ascertained by income anymore.
I also feel that I have to include, as a part of my continuous identity, the fact that I am from Essex. By this, I mean that I have lived pretty much in Essex my entire life (uni term-time excepted), and the vast majority of both my maternal and paternal family originate from the county. Never has being from Essex carried with it such bulging baggage of nationwide stereotypes and pastiche as it does today. We all know, I am sad to say, probably without exception, that this is almost entirely the doing of ITV wildlife documentary The Only Way is Essex. Exactly what this title means, I am not sure the production team thought through. Unless it is a tenuous reference to the M25.
The fact that I am from Essex was never a salient fact about my personality, or a noteworthy feature of my life until I started university in Southampton. Not that my university town is particularly relevant, I am sure the reaction would be the same wherever I studied, every time I answer the question ‘where are you from?’ Responses to my answer range from the popular ‘is it like the TV show??’ to the confusing ‘You can’t be!’, but all are fuelled by the tacky, materialisitc and distinctly orange image of Essex that has pervaded the nation in the last few years. This is a frustrating phenomenon, as my experience of Essex could not be further removed from this myth.
For a start, I live in a town that is surrounded by rolling, country hills, minute villages, and a curiously disproportionate number of secondary schools. There is never a Chihuahua or vajazzle to be seen. The Essex stereotypers could be forgiven this mistake, when one remembers that ‘TOWIE’ is set primarily in Brentwood, a town situated roughly 40 minutes from where I live. However, I am deeply familiar with Brentwood, as it is where my mum grew up and consequently my Grandad still lives. To me, Brentwood is replete with memories of visiting my grandparents as a small child, of digestive biscuits, accompanying them to the high-street to buy the morning paper, and their cosy house in a leafy cul-de-sac. It is the last place on earth I would ever associate with beauty salons and glitzy nightclubs.
Visiting the place now, in light of its recent transformation, is a deeply strange and quite humorous experience. This idea can be captured perfectly in a scene I was privy to, whilst driving along the high-street on a Grandparental visit. This was the image of Amy Child’s Salon, glamourised on the show as a decadent utopia of wax, spray-tan and sequins, built underneath a 1960s, grey tower-block just off a roundabout with hoards of Northern tourists gathered around it hungrily snapping photos. What an utterly ridiculous sign of the times. However much I resent it though, every part of this Essex discourse welds itself to my continuous identity. As much as I have never been to the Sugar Hut, it is a part of me through its synonymity with the county I call home.
Thrown into this mix of manufactured heritage and erroneous stereotypes that so far I have pin-pointed as my continuous identity, is the fact that I am never, ever, physically identified as British. The reasons for this have yet to be fully ascertained, but it has been speculated that it is due to anything from my dark hair and olive skin, to one specific mole just below my left eye. Whatever the reasons, I have been asked (mostly by natives of the country in question), if I am Spanish, Italian, Moroccan, Indian, Hawaiian, Iranian, Chinese, and more I’m sure I’ve forgotten. How this is possible, I don’t know, but it does add an interesting dimension to the idea of identity, I suppose more of a visual, continuous identity.
Although, having thought about it, when compared to a forged, augmented and altered idea of national heritage that is portrayed through stately homes and gardens, and the essentialised, generalist, fake Essex stereotype, what could be more British than perceptible traces of multiple other cultures?