So I’m late to the party here, but this is a very early version of a diagram I’m putting together that corrects a couple of issues with the diagram OP posted.
Now if someone can tell me what exactly “Britain” is? People say it all the time, like this is the largest statue of a vulva in Britain. Just shorthand for Great Britain, or is it something else?
It’s like saying America to mean the United States. Technically America includes Canada and excludes Hawaii. But when people say America they actually mean US + Alaska and Hawaii but not Canada.
Well, Scots would often say “we’re not British but we are Scottish” since British usually means “from the UK” but I don’t think any of them would deny that most of Scotland is in Great Britain.
The words that ultimately gave us “Britain” have been in use for about 2,000 years, give or take a century or two. Politically and culturally a tremendous lot has happened in the meantime. Which is probably why we’re left with this almost indecipherable mine field.
Tell me about it. Immigrants? From Britain? Taking over (culturally) a foreign land. You couldn’t make it up. I once witnessed some drunk Bretons speaking to some drunk Welsh in their respective languages… and “kind of” understanding each other.
I though it was complicated here in Australia where our states/territories (idk the differencd) all can have some very different rules and stuff at least we have mostly clear borders
It’s basically the same argument Argentina has about the Falkland Islands. When Argentina was part of the Spanish empire the Falkland Islands were part of the empire, not that the Spanish did anything with the islands. But at no time in history has Argentina existed as an independent country and has had ownership of the islands.
Yeah, the channel islands and the Isle of Man have more autonomy. Officially they are “self-governing British Crown Dependencies”.
Jersey and Guernsey have different VAT rates for instance. For years, play.com was based in Jersey solely so they wouldn’t have to pay VAT on most of the cheaper stuff they sold to the mainland.
It’s not an actual term that is used though. “Great Britain” and “Ireland” are the names of the islands, “the United Kingdom” and “(the Republic of) Ireland” are the names of the sovereign states, “the British Isles” is (one) name for all the bits of land. “British Islands” is not an official term or one that anyone uses.
At least for Scots, this is not a general case. Some consider themselves not to be British because they don't want Scotland to be part of the UK, others will take exception to the conflation of "British" with "English" because that implies that Scotland is just considered part of England. You don't even have to have strong feelings either way about either England or the UK for that one.
At least for now, the word "British" is associated more with the political entity of the UK than the geographical entity of the island of Great Britain. That most of Scotland is on the island of Great Britain will not persuade anyone in the first camp.
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