Bulldog or Beaver?

Being a dual citizen can screw with your sense of identity.

Last night when I was at work at the bar, during a conversation where England came up, one of my regular customers said the phrase “your people” to me when he was referring to Brits. This got me pondering why it is that some people recognize that part of me and some people don’t.

When I was well into my adult years and living in Canada again I made the conscious decision to identify as Canadian. I monitored my transatlantic accent more carefully so I had fewer slips when around English accents. It makes me shudder to hear a North American affecting a British accent, or what I call the Madonna Accent. Ugh. I started answering the question “Where are you from?” with the answer “I was mostly raised in Canada”. I used to answer rather verbosely, while trying to be accurate, something like “Well, I was born in England but we emigrated when I was young, and after a few trips back and forth, settled mainly in Canada, although every summer we visited.” I didn’t want to let go of my claim on England, my own Englishness; I needed people to know that was part of who I identified as.

The customer I mentioned is from Fiji and a long time Canadian. He knows what dual citizenship is like. I also have a Jamaican/Canadian customer and a couple of British/Canadian friends who talk to me about England as though I’m British. Which I am! But most single-citizenship Canadians look doubtfully at me when I talk about the English part of my life experience. I certainly feel more Canadian than English. My accent is certainly more consistently Canadian.

I anticipate that after being back in England for some amount of time, I may have to reassess my self-identity. Will I feel more or less British when I live there? I honestly don’t know what to expect.