How
British
Is It?
Below are twelve things that are part of British life — food, institutions, wealth, culture, geography.
For each one, you will be asked a single question: how connected is this to the British Empire?
There are no right or wrong answers at this stage. Rate what you actually think, not what you expect the answer to be.
You will see the historical record afterwards — alongside your own judgments.
connection
connection
connection
without empire
Your ratings, alongside the evidence.
The left column shows what you said. The right shows where the historical record places each item. The gap — where it exists — is the lesson.
"Why does empire keep appearing — even in things that seem entirely domestic?"
Look at the items where the gap between your rating and the historical record was largest. That gap is not a mistake in your reasoning. It reflects something the historian Sathnam Sanghera calls imperial amnesia — a structural forgetting, not a personal one.
The question worth sitting with is not whether empire shaped these things, but why that shaping is so hard to see from inside British culture.
Now look at the flag behind this page differently. The Union Jack is not one flag. It is three overlapping flags — St George's Cross (England), St Andrew's Cross (Scotland), St Patrick's Cross (Ireland) — each representing a different political and military history, layered into a single symbol. The result looks natural. It was constructed.
The next instrument will ask: who made that invisibility possible?