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What is British culture?

145 replies

SenoraPostrophe · 24/11/2004 20:55

I've been asked to teach an English course (hooray - programming gets boring sometimes) which includes a section on "British culture".

Obviously I could throw a few ideas together myself, but it is quite an interesting question and I'm sure I'd miss something.

Ideas so far:

dry, Self-depreciating humour
Dinner parties (the Spanish don't do them - they meet up in restaurants, kids and all, instead)
Fish and chips
Toad in the hole
Sticky toffee pudding
Christmas pudding
custard
Kids getting up at 5am christmas day (don't do that here either - me and dd were the only ones awake in the whole street at 8am last year)
pubs
pub quizzes
culturally adventurous (Rock n roll and hip hop only became mainstream in the US after they were in the UK. Don't know if that's because the US is culturally conservative or racist).
Shakespeare
tea
chocolate digestives
Branston (mmm Branston)
Stilton

....that's it so far. Can you tell I haven't had tea yet?

also as an aside, the students will be TV execs who want to be able to talk to their counterparts at British stations. What do TV execs talk about?

OP posts:
Frenchgirl · 25/11/2004 10:06

tabloids and page 3 girls
millions of insane cookery shows on tv
french bashing
millions of types of crisps in the supermarket
classes
people obsessed with their gardens and borders
Xmas presents for dogs and cats at the pet shop

Frenchgirl · 25/11/2004 10:07

marthamoo, am so glad you say that, I always wondered why people did that!!!

Cam · 25/11/2004 10:13

SP, I think you could explain everything anyone needs to know about British Culture just by showing the whole series of Fawlty Towers....

spacemonkey · 25/11/2004 10:13

Queueing
Sexual Repression
Lager Louts and Xenophobes
Double Decker Buses

spacemonkey · 25/11/2004 10:18

Black Humour
The NHS

spacemonkey · 25/11/2004 10:19

Pork Pies

spacemonkey · 25/11/2004 10:21

Drizzle

spacemonkey · 25/11/2004 10:22

When I was a kid I thought the English national dress was a suit and bowler hat

bloss · 25/11/2004 10:26

Message withdrawn

bloss · 25/11/2004 10:27

Message withdrawn

Blu · 25/11/2004 10:31

And some of the worlds best beaches, too!

Cam · 25/11/2004 10:32

spacemonkey, it is!

Marina · 25/11/2004 10:34

John Peel, Melvyn Bragg, Howard Goodall, Mariella Frostrup, Jonathan Miller
The Kinks, Franz Ferdinand, The Pet Shop Boys, Stock Aitken and Waterman, British Sea Power, Nick Drake
Tom Stoppard, Michael Frayn, Patrick Marber, Dennis Potter, Caryl Churchill
Philip Pullman, JK Rowling, Geraldine McCaughrean
Jacqueline Wilson, Byker Grove, Grange Hill
Hanif Kureishi, Benjamin Zephaniah, Zadie Smith, Monica Ali
Philip Larkin, Adrian Mitchell, Ted Hughes, Tony Harrison, Simon Armitage
The League of Gentlemen, Monty Python, Shaun of the Dead, Spaced, Green Wing, The Fast Show, Alan Partridge, The Office, Little Britain, Jeeves & Wooster, Blackadder

spacemonkey · 25/11/2004 10:34

I think it was when I was watching the Eurovision Song Contest and I was about 7 years old. For each country they showed people in national dress and I genuinely did not know what the English would wear. Of course the Welsh and Scots do have a national dress but we Englishers don't, do we?

spacemonkey · 25/11/2004 10:35

Marina, your list makes it abundantly clear to me why it's great to be a brit!

spacemonkey · 25/11/2004 10:35

Morris dancing

Marina · 25/11/2004 10:40

Vaughan Williams, Purcell, Michael Nyman, Michael Tippett, Jonathan Dove, James MacMillan...
I will find your chamber music thread Spacemonkey I did ask my colleagues for more suggestions!

Marina · 25/11/2004 10:40

BENJAMIN BRITTEN...

spacemonkey · 25/11/2004 10:41

not forgetting Benjamin Britten!

spacemonkey · 25/11/2004 10:41
Grin
Blu · 25/11/2004 10:42

Irreverence. 'Elastic' response to authority (my canadian frineds always say no-one else goes against the 'no exit' signs on the tubes, etc).
Pragmatism.

Marina · 25/11/2004 10:42

Might as well do it here SM! Our top tips were indeed B Britten, Dvorak and Frank Bridge "Idylls" for something a little off the beaten track! Great minds...

spacemonkey · 25/11/2004 10:43

Thank you marina!

Blu · 25/11/2004 10:43

Fawlty Towers, Black Adder,
Pantomime

spacemonkey · 25/11/2004 10:44

Hidden depths

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