Alongside emerging anti-immigrant and anti-Islam attitudes, in many European countries, including Britain, sentiments of nationalism have arisen that resurrect more traditional or reactionary expressions of national identity. In some cases, however, this ‘resurrection’ of older forms of national belonging has been co-opted by marginalised communities as well as by the dominant group within the society. In planning procedures, ‘Englishness’ is submerged in legal processes about heritage and planning and only obliquely referred to in official local government debate. The resurrection of different forms of Englishness by various interest groups has been the subject of burgeoning research over the last decade. This paper extends this field by demonstrating that Muslim groups are beginning to articulate notions of cultural ‘Englishness’ rather than civic ‘Britishness’ which mirror the rise of ideas of ‘Englishness’ on the extreme right.
In this context, this paper aims to establish how notions of ‘Englishness’ are variously performed, constructed or experienced in relation to a question which has become the focus of fierce debate in Britain and across Europe.
