In the U.S. , it ’s not rare for the termsEnglishandBritishto be used interchangeably to depict anything postulate the realm that gave us such gems asPride and Prejudice , Paddington Bear , andBenedict Cumberbatch .
ButEnglishandBritishdon’t mean the same matter — becauseEngland and Britainaren’t the same place .
To make a centuries - long story short , England is one of three nation located on the island of Great Britain , along with Wales and Scotland . TheUnited Kingdom ’s full titleisthe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland , which makes it middling clear which nations fall under the UK umbrella : England , Wales , Scotland , and Northern Ireland . The respite of the island of Ireland is its own country — theRepublic of Ireland .
Because England is part of Great Britain , everything English is technically also British , but not everything British is also English . You should n’t , for example , refer to theLoch Ness Monsteras an Englishcryptid . It ( purportedly ) lives in Scotland , so you’re able to call it Scotch or British . In other Scripture , only things from England are English ; anything from England , Scotland , or Wales is British .
Ireland is slightly more complicated . If someone hails from the Republic of Ireland , they ’re just Irish . Northern Irish peoplequalifyfor both British and Irish citizenship , so they mightconsiderthemselves British as well as Irish . Plus , since the United Kingdom does n’t have its own adjective , Britishcan also beunderstoodto think “ of the United Kingdom”—and Northern Ireland is of the United Kingdom ( though that termisn’t always popularin Northern Ireland ) .
A version of this floor ran in 2022 ; it has been update for 2023 .
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