Coordinates	°′″N°′″N
Conventional long name	England
Common name	England
Flag width	125px
Alt	Vertical red cross on a white background
Image coat	Royal Standard of England (2) at 3^5 ratio.svg
Alt	Stylised image of three golden coloured lions, heads facing left, one above the other, on a dark red background
Symbol width	125px
Symbol type	Royal Banner
National motto	(French)"God and my right"
National anthem	None (''de jure'')God Save the Queen (''de facto'')
Prime minister	David Cameron
Patron saint	Saint George
Map width	250px
Map caption
Alt	Map of England within the British Isles and within Europe
Capital	London
Demonym	English
Largest city	capital
Official languages	English (''de facto'')
Regional languages	Cornish
Ethnic groups	87.5% White, 6.0% South Asian, 2.9% Black, 1.9% Mixed race, 0.8% Chinese, 0.8% Other
Ethnic groups year	2009
Government type	Non-devolved state within a constitutional monarchy
Legislature	Parliament of the United Kingdom
Leader title1	Monarch
Leader name1	Elizabeth II
Leader title2	Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
Leader name2	David Cameron MP
Area magnitude	1 E11
Area km2	130,395
Area sq mi	50,346
Population estimate	51,446,000
Population estimate year	2008
Population census	49,138,831
Population census year	2001
Population density km2	395
Currency	Pound sterling
Currency code	GBP
Time zone	GMT
Utc offset	0
Time zone dst	BST
Utc offset dst	+1
Cctld	.uk
Calling code	44
Date format	dd/mm/yyyy (AD)
Drives on	left }}

England () is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental Europe. Most of England comprises the central and southern part of the island of Great Britain in the North Atlantic. The country also includes over 100 smaller islands such as the Isles of Scilly and the Isle of Wight.

The area now called England was first inhabited by modern humans during the Upper Palaeolithic period, but it takes its name from the Angles, one of the Germanic tribes who settled during the 5th and 6th centuries. England became a unified state in AD 927, and since the Age of Discovery, which began during the 15th century, has had a significant cultural and legal impact on the wider world. The English language, the Anglican Church, and English law — the basis for the common law legal systems of many other countries around the world — developed in England, and the country's parliamentary system of government has been widely adopted by other nations. The Industrial Revolution began in 18th-century England, transforming its society into the world's first industrialised nation. England's Royal Society laid the foundations of modern experimental science.

England's terrain mostly comprises low hills and plains, especially in central and southern England. However, there are uplands in the north (for example, the mountainous Lake District, Pennines, and Yorkshire Dales) and in the south west (for example, Dartmoor and the Cotswolds). London, England's capital, is the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. England's population is about 51 million, around 84% of the population of the United Kingdom, and is largely concentrated in London, the South East and conurbations in the Midlands, the North West, the North East and Yorkshire, which each developed as major industrial regions during the 19th century. Meadowlands and pastures are found beyond the major cities.

The Kingdom of England—which after 1284 included Wales—was a sovereign state until 1 May 1707, when the Acts of Union put into effect the terms agreed in the Treaty of Union the previous year, resulting in a political union with the Kingdom of Scotland to create the new Kingdom of Great Britain. In 1801, Great Britain was united with the Kingdom of Ireland through another Act of Union to become the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922, the Irish Free State was established as a separate dominion, but the Royal and Parliamentary Titles Act 1927 reincorporated into the kingdom six Irish counties to officially create the current United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Etymology

The name "England" is derived from the Old English name ''Engla land'', which means "land of the Angles". The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages. The Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea. According to the ''Oxford English Dictionary'', the first known use of "England" to refer to the southern part of the island of Great Britain occurs in 897, and its modern spelling was first used in 1538.

The earliest attested mention of the name occurs in the 1st century work by Tacitus, ''Germania'', in which the Latin word ''Anglii'' is used. The etymology of the tribal name itself is disputed by scholars; it has been suggested that it derives from the shape of the Angeln peninsula, an ''angular'' shape. How and why a term derived from the name of a tribe that was less significant than others, such as the Saxons, came to be used for the entire country and its people is not known, but it seems this is related to the custom of calling the Germanic people in Britain ''Angli Saxones'' or English Saxons.

An alternative name for England is Albion. The name ''Albion'' originally referred to the entire island of Great Britain. The earliest record of the name appears in the Aristotelian Corpus, specifically the 4th century BC ''De Mundo'': "Beyond the Pillars of Hercules is the ocean that flows round the earth. In it are two very large islands called Britannia; these are Albion and Ierne". The word ''Albion'' (Ἀλβίων) or ''insula Albionum'' has two possible origins. It either derives from a cognate of the Latin ''albus'' meaning white, a reference to the white cliffs of Dover, the only part of Britain visible from the European Continent, or from the phrase in ''Massaliote Periplus'', the "island of the ''Albiones''". ''Albion'' is now applied to England in a more poetic capacity. Another romantic name for England is Loegria, related to the Welsh word for England, ''Lloegr'', and made popular by its use in Arthurian legend.

History

Prehistory and antiquity

The earliest known evidence of human presence in the area now known as England was that of ''Homo antecessor'', dating to approximately 780,000 years ago. The oldest proto-human bones discovered in England date from 500,000 years ago. Modern humans are known to have first inhabited the area during the Upper Paleolithic period, though permanent settlements were only established within the last 6,000 years. After the last ice age only large mammals such as mammoths, bison and woolly rhinoceros remained. Roughly 11,000 years ago, when the ice sheets began to recede, humans repopulated the area; genetic research suggests they came from the northern part of the Iberian Peninsula. The sea level was lower than now, and Britain was connected by land to both Ireland and Eurasia. As the seas rose, it was separated from Ireland 10,000 years ago and from Eurasia two millennia later.

The Beaker culture arrived around 2500 BC, introducing drinking and food vessels constructed from clay, as well as vessels used as reduction pots to smelt copper ores. It was during this time that major Neolithic monuments such as Stonehenge and Avebury were constructed. By heating together tin and copper, both of which were in abundance in the area, the Beaker culture people made bronze, and later iron from iron ores. According to John T. Koch and others, England in the Late Bronze Age was part of a maritime trading-networked culture called the Atlantic Bronze Age that included all of Britain and also Ireland, France, Spain and Portugal. In those areas, Celtic languages developed; Tartessian may have been the earliest written Celtic language.

During the Iron Age, Celtic culture, deriving from the Hallstatt and La Tène cultures, arrived from Central Europe. The development of iron smelting allowed the construction of better ploughs, advancing agriculture (for instance, with Celtic fields), as well as the production of more effective weapons. Brythonic was the spoken language during this time. Society was tribal; according to Ptolemy's ''Geographia'' there were around 20 different tribes in the area. However, earlier divisions are unknown because the Britons were not literate. Like other regions on the edge of the Empire, Britain had long enjoyed trading links with the Romans. Julius Caesar of the Roman Republic attempted to invade twice in 55 BC; although largely unsuccessful, he managed to set up a client king from the Trinovantes.

The Romans invaded Britain in AD 43 during the reign of Emperor Claudius, subsequently conquering much of Britain, and the area was incorporated into the Roman Empire as Britannia province. The best-known of the native tribes who attempted to resist were the Catuvellauni led by Caratacus. Later, an uprising led by Boudica, queen of the Iceni, ended with Boudica's suicide following her defeat at the Battle of Watling Street. This era saw a Greco-Roman culture prevail with the introduction of Roman law, Roman architecture, sewage systems, many agricultural items, and silk. In the 3rd century, Emperor Septimius Severus died at York, where Constantine was subsequently proclaimed emperor. Christianity was first introduced around this time, though there are traditions linked to Glastonbury claiming an introduction through Joseph of Arimathea, while others claim through Lucius of Britain. By 410, as the empire declined, Britain was left exposed by the withdrawal of Roman army units, to defend the frontiers in continental Europe and take part in civil wars.

Middle Ages

Roman military withdrawals left Britain open to invasion by pagan, seafaring warriors from north-western continental Europe, chiefly the Angles, Saxons and Jutes who had long raided the coasts of the Roman province and now began to settle, initially in the eastern part of the country. Their advance was contained for some decades after the Britons' victory at the Battle of Mount Badon, but subsequently resumed, over-running the fertile lowlands of Britain and reducing the area under Brythonic control to a series of separate enclaves in the more rugged country to the west by the end of the 6th century. Contemporary texts describing this period are extremely scarce, giving rise to its description as a Dark Age. The nature and progression of the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain is consequently subject to considerable disagreement. Christianity had in general disappeared from the conquered territories, but was reintroduced by missionaries from Rome led by Augustine from 597 onwards and by Irish missionaries led by Aidan around the same time. Disputes between the varying influences represented by these missions ended in victory for the Roman tradition.

During the settlement period the lands ruled by the incomers seem to have been fragmented into numerous tribal territories, but by the 7th century, when substantial evidence of the situation again becomes available, these had coalesced into roughly a dozen kingdoms including Northumbria, Mercia, Wessex, East Anglia, Essex, Kent and Sussex. Over the following centuries this process of political consolidation continued. The 7th century saw a struggle for hegemony between Northumbria and Mercia, which in the 8th century gave way to Mercian preeminence. In the early 9th century Mercia was displaced as the foremost kingdom by Wessex. Later in that century escalating attacks by the Danes culminated in the conquest of the north and east of England, overthrowing the kingdoms of Northumbria, Mercia and East Anglia. Wessex under Alfred the Great was left as the only surviving English kingdom, and under his successors it steadily expanded at the expense of the kingdoms of the Danelaw. This brought about the political unification of England, first accomplished under Æthelstan in 927 and definitively established after further conflicts by Eadred in 953. A fresh wave of Scandinavian attacks from the late 10th century ended with the conquest of this united kingdom by Sweyn Forkbeard in 1013 and again by his son Cnut in 1016, turning it into the centre of a short-lived North Sea empire that also included Denmark and Norway. However the native royal dynasty was restored with the accession of Edward the Confessor in 1042.

A dispute over the succession to Edward led to the Norman conquest of England in 1066, accomplished by an army led by Duke William of Normandy. The Normans themselves originated from Scandinavia and had settled in Normandy in the late 9th and early 10th centuries. This conquest led to the almost total dispossession of the English elite and its replacement by a new French-speaking aristocracy, whose speech had a profound and permanent effect on the English language.

The House of Plantagenet from Anjou inherited the English throne under Henry II, adding England to the budding Angevin Empire of fiefs the family had inherited in France including Aquitaine. They reigned for three centuries, proving noted monarchs such as Richard I, Edward I, Edward III and Henry V. The period saw changes in trade and legislation, including the signing of the ''Magna Carta'', an English legal charter used to limit the sovereign's powers by law and protect the privileges of freemen. Catholic monasticism flourished, providing philosophers and the universities of Oxford and Cambridge were founded with royal patronage. The Principality of Wales became a Plantagenet fief during the 13th century and the Lordship of Ireland was gifted to the English monarchy by the Pope.

During the 14th century, the Plantagenets and House of Valois both claimed to be legitimate claimants to House of Capet and with it France—the two powers clashed in the Hundred Years' War. The Black Death epidemic hit England, starting in 1348, it eventually killed up to half of England's inhabitants. From 1453 to 1487 civil war between two branches of the royal family occurred—the Yorkists and Lancastrians—known as the Wars of the Roses. Eventually it led to the Yorkists losing the throne entirely to a Welsh noble family the Tudors, a branch of the Lancastrians headed by Henry Tudor who invaded with Welsh and Breton mercenaries, gaining victory at the Battle of Bosworth Field where the Yorkist king Richard III was killed.

Early Modern

During the Tudor period, the Renaissance reached England through Italian courtiers, who reintroduced artistic, educational and scholarly debate from classical antiquity. During this time England began to develop naval skills, and exploration to the West intensified.

Henry VIII broke from communion with the Catholic Church, over issues relating to divorce, under the Acts of Supremacy in 1534 which proclaimed the monarch head of the Church of England. In contrast with much of European Protestantism, the roots of the split were more political than theological..|group=note}} He also legally incorporated his ancestral land Wales into the Kingdom of England with the 1535–1542 acts. There were internal religious conflicts during the reigns of Henry's daughters, Mary I and Elizabeth I. The former brought the country back to Catholicism, while the later broke from it again, more forcefully asserting the supremacy of Anglicanism.

An English fleet under Francis Drake defeated an invading Spanish Armada during the Elizabethan period. Competing with Spain, the first English colony in the Americas was founded in 1585 by explorer Walter Raleigh in Virginia and named Roanoke. The Roanoke colony failed and is known as the lost colony, after it was found abandoned on the return of the late arriving supply ship. With the East India Company, England also competed with the Dutch and French in the East. The political structure of the island was changed in 1603, when the Stuart James VI of Scotland, a kingdom which was a longtime rival, inherited the throne of England as James I—creating a personal union . He styled himself King of Great Britain, although this had no basis in English law.

Based on conflicting political, religious and social positions, the English Civil War was fought between the supporters of Parliament and those of King Charles I, known as Roundheads and Cavaliers respectively. This was an interwoven part of the wider multifaceted Wars of the Three Kingdoms, involving Scotland and Ireland. The Parliamentarians were victorious, Charles I was executed and the kingdom replaced with the Commonwealth. Leader of the Parliament forces, Oliver Cromwell declared himself Lord Protector in 1653, a period of personal rule followed. After Cromwell's death, and his son Richard's resignation as Lord Protector, Charles II was invited to return as monarch in 1660 with the Restoration. It was now constitutionally established that King and Parliament should rule together, though Parliament would have the real power. This was established with the Bill of Rights in 1689. Among the statutes set down were that the law could only be made by Parliament and could not be suspended by the King, and the King could not impose taxes or raise an army without prior approval by Parliament. With the founding of the Royal Society in 1660, science was greatly encouraged.

The Great Fire of London in 1666 gutted the City of London but it was rebuilt shortly afterwards. In Parliament two factions had emerged—the Tories and Whigs. The former were royalists while the latter were classical liberals. Though the Tories initially supported Catholic king James II, some of them, along with the Whigs, deposed him in the Revolution of 1688 and invited Dutch prince William III to become monarch. Some English people, especially in the north, were Jacobites and continued to support James and his sons. After the parliaments of England and Scotland agreed, the two countries joined in political union, to create the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. To accommodate the union, institutions such as the law and national church of each remained separate.

Late Modern and contemporary

Under the newly formed Kingdom of Great Britain, output from the Royal Society and other English initiatives combined with the Scottish Enlightenment to create innovations in science and engineering. This paved the way for the establishment of the British Empire. Domestically it drove the Industrial Revolution, a period of profound change in the socioeconomic and cultural conditions of England, resulting in industrialised agriculture, manufacture, engineering and mining, as well as new and pioneering road, rail and water networks to facilitate their expansion and development. The opening of Northwest England's Bridgewater Canal in 1761 ushered in the canal age in Britain. In 1825 the world's first permanent steam locomotive-hauled passenger railway—the Stockton and Darlington Railway—opened to the public.

During the Industrial Revolution, many workers moved from England's countryside to new and expanding urban industrial areas to work in factories, for instance at Manchester and Birmingham, dubbed "Warehouse City" and "Workshop of the World" respectively. England maintained relative stability throughout the French Revolution; William Pitt the Younger was British Prime Minister for the reign of George III. During the Napoleonic Wars, Napoleon planned to invade from the south-east. However this failed to manifest and the Napoleonic forces were defeated by the British at sea by Lord Nelson and on land by the Duke of Wellington. The Napoleonic Wars fostered a concept of Britishness and a united national British people, shared with the Scots and Welsh.

London became the largest and most populous metropolitan area in the world during the Victorian era, and trade within the British Empire—as well as the standing of the British military and navy—was prestigious. Political agitation at home from radicals such as the Chartists and the suffragettes enabled legislative reform and universal suffrage. Power shifts in east-central Europe led to World War I; hundreds of thousands of English soldiers died fighting for the United Kingdom as part of the Allies.|group=note}} Two decades later, in World War II, the United Kingdom was again one of the Allies. At the end of the Phoney War, Winston Churchill became the wartime Prime Minister. Developments in warfare technology saw many cities damaged by air-raids during the Blitz. Following the war, the British Empire experienced rapid decolonisation, and there was a speeding up of technological innovations; automobiles became the primary means of transport and Frank Whittle's development of the jet engine led to wider air travel. Residential patterns were altered in England by private motoring, and by the creation of the National Health Service (NHS) in 1948. England's NHS provided publicly funded health care to all UK permanent residents free at the point of need, being paid for from general taxation. Combined, these changes prompted the reform of local government in England in the mid-20th century.

Since the 20th century there has been significant population movement to England, mostly from other parts of the British Isles, but also from the Commonwealth, particularly the Indian subcontinent. Since the 1970s there has been a large move away from manufacturing and an increasing emphasis on the service industry. As part of the United Kingdom, the area joined a common market initiative called the European Economic Community which became the European Union. Since the late 20th century the administration of the United Kingdom has moved towards devolved governance in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. England and Wales continues to exist as a jurisdiction within the United Kingdom. Devolution has stimulated a greater emphasis on a more English-specific identity and patriotism. There is no devolved English government, but an attempt to create a similar system on a sub-regional basis was rejected by referendum.

Governance

Politics

As part of the United Kingdom, the basic political system in England is a constitutional monarchy and parliamentary system. There has not been a Government of England since 1707, when the Acts of Union 1707, putting into effect the terms of the Treaty of Union, joined England and Scotland to form the Kingdom of Great Britain. Before the union England was ruled by its monarch and the Parliament of England. Today England is governed directly by the Parliament of the United Kingdom, although other countries of the United Kingdom have devolved governments. In the House of Commons which is the lower house of the British Parliament based at the Palace of Westminster, there are 532 Members of Parliament (MPs) for constituencies in England, out of the 650 total.

In the United Kingdom general election, 2010 the Conservative Party had won an absolute majority in England's 532 contested seats with 61 seats more than all other parties combined (the Speaker of the House not being counted as a Conservative). However, taking Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales into account this was not enough to secure an overall majority, resulting in a hung parliament. In order to achieve a majority the Conservative party, headed by David Cameron, entered into a coalition agreement with the third largest party, the Liberal Democrats, led by Nick Clegg. Subsequently Gordon Brown announced he was stepping down as prime minister and leader of the Labour party, now led by Ed Miliband.

As the United Kingdom is a member of the European Union, there are elections held regionally in England to decide who is sent as Members of the European Parliament. The 2009 European Parliament election saw the regions of England elect the following MEPs: 23 Conservatives, ten Labour, nine UK Independence Party (UKIP), nine Liberal Democrats, two Greens and two British National Party (BNP).

Since devolution, in which other countries of the United Kingdom—Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland—each have their own devolved parliament or assemblies for local issues, there has been debate about how to counterbalance this in England. Originally it was planned that various regions of England would be devolved, but following the proposal's rejection by the North East in a referendum, this has not been carried out.

One major issue is the West Lothian question, in which MPs from Scotland and Wales are able to vote on legislation affecting only England, while English MPs have no equivalent right to legislate on devolved matters. This when placed in the context of England being the only country of the United Kingdom not to have free cancer treatment, prescriptions, residential care for the elderly and free top-up university fees, has led to a steady rise in English nationalism. Some have suggested the creation of a devolved English parliament, while others have proposed simply limiting voting on legislation which only affects England to English MPs.

Law

The English law legal system, developed over the centuries, is the basis of common law legal systems used in most Commonwealth countries and the United States (except Louisiana). Despite now being part of the United Kingdom, the legal system of the Courts of England and Wales continued, under the Treaty of Union, as a separate legal system from the one used in Scotland. The general essence of English law is that it is made by judges sitting in courts, applying their common sense and knowledge of legal precedent—''stare decisis''—to the facts before them.

The court system is headed by the Supreme Court of Judicature, consisting of the Court of Appeal, the High Court of Justice for civil cases, and the Crown Court for criminal cases. The Supreme Court of the United Kingdom is the highest court for criminal and civil cases in England and Wales. It was created in 2009 after constitutional changes, taking over the judicial functions of the House of Lords. A decision of the Supreme Court is binding on every other court in the hierarchy, which must follow its directions.

Crime increased between 1981 and 1995, but fell by 42% in the period 1995–2006. The prison population doubled over the same period, giving it the highest incarceration rate in Western Europe at 147 per 100,000. Her Majesty's Prison Service, reporting to the Ministry of Justice, manages most prisons, housing over 80,000 convicts.

Regions, counties, and districts

} The subdivisions of England consist of up to four levels of subnational division controlled through a variety of types of administrative entities created for the purposes of local government. The highest tier of local government were the nine regions of England: North East, North West, Yorkshire and the Humber, East Midlands, West Midlands, East, South East, South West, and London. These were created in 1994 as Government Offices, used by the British Government to deliver a wide range of policies and programmes regionally, but there are no elected bodies at this level, except in London, and in 2011 the regional Government offices were abolished. The same boundaries remain in use for electing Members of the European Parliament on a regional basis.

After devolution began to take place in other parts of the United Kingdom it was planned that referendums for the regions of England would take place for their own elected regional assemblies as a counterweight. London accepted in 1998: the London Assembly was created two years later. However, when the proposal was rejected by the northern England devolution referendums, 2004 in the North East, further referendums were cancelled. The regional assemblies outside London were abolished in 2010, and their functions transferred to respective Regional Development Agencies and a new system of local authority leaders' boards.

Below the regional level, all of England is divided into 48 ceremonial counties. These are used primarily as a geographical frame of reference and have developed gradually since the Middle Ages, with some established as recently as 1974. Each has a Lord Lieutenant and High Sheriff; these posts are used to represent the British monarch locally. Outside Greater London and the Isles of Scilly, England is also divided into 83 metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties; these correspond to areas used for the purposes of local government and may consist of a single district or be divided into several.

There are six metropolitan counties based on the most heavily urbanised areas, which do not have county councils. In these areas the principal authorities are the councils of the subdivisions, the metropolitan boroughs. Elsewhere, 27 non-metropolitan "shire" counties have a county council and are divided into districts, each with a district council. They are typically, though not always, found in more rural areas. The remaining non-metropolitan counties are of a single district and usually correspond to large towns or counties with low populations; they are known as unitary authorities. Greater London has a different system for local government, with 32 London boroughs, plus the City of London covering a small area at the core, governed by the City of London Corporation. At the most localised level, much of England is divided into civil parishes with councils; they do not exist in Greater London.

Geography

Landscape and rivers

Geographically England includes the central and southern two-thirds of the island of Great Britain, plus such offshore islands as the Isle of Wight and the Isles of Scilly. It is bordered by two other countries of the United Kingdom—to the north by Scotland and to the west by Wales. England is closer to the European continent than any other part of mainland Britain. It is separated from France by a sea gap, though the two countries are connected by the Channel Tunnel near Folkestone. England also has shores on the Irish Sea, North Sea and Atlantic Ocean.

The ports of London, Liverpool, and Newcastle lie on the tidal rivers Thames, Mersey and Tyne respectively. At , the Severn is the longest river flowing through England. It empties into the Bristol Channel and is notable for its Severn Bore tidal waves, which can reach in height. However, the longest river entirely in England is the Thames, which is in length. There are many lakes in England; the largest is Windermere, within the aptly named Lake District.

In geological terms, the Pennines, known as the "backbone of England", are the oldest range of mountains in the country, originating from the end of the Paleozoic Era around 300 million years ago. Their geological composition includes, among others, sandstone and limestone, and also coal. There are karst landscapes in calcite areas such as parts of Yorkshire and Derbyshire. The Pennine landscape is high moorland in upland areas, indented by fertile valleys of the region's rivers. They contain three national parks, the Yorkshire Dales, Northumberland, and the Peak District. The highest point in England, at , is Scafell Pike in Cumbria. Straddling the border between England and Scotland are the Cheviot Hills.

The English Lowlands are to the south of the Pennines, consisting of green rolling hills, including the Cotswold Hills, Chiltern Hills, North and South Downs—where they meet the sea they form white rock exposures such as the cliffs of Dover. The granite Southwest Peninsula in the West Country includes upland moorland, such as Dartmoor and Exmoor, and enjoys a mild climate; both are national parks.

Climate

England has a temperate maritime climate: it is mild with temperatures not much lower than in winter and not much higher than in summer. The weather is damp relatively frequently and is changeable. The coldest months are January and February, the latter particularly on the English coast, while July is normally the warmest month. Months with mild to warm weather are May, June, September and October. Rainfall is spread fairly evenly throughout the year.

Important influences on the climate of England are its proximity to the Atlantic Ocean, its northern latitude and the warming of the sea by the Gulf Stream. Rainfall is higher in the west, and parts of the Lake District receive more rain than anywhere else in the country. Since weather records began, the highest temperature recorded was on 10 August 2003 at Brogdale in Kent, while the lowest was on 10 January 1982 in Edgmond, Shropshire.

Major conurbations

The Greater London Urban Area is by far the largest metropolitan area in England and one of the busiest cities in the world. It is considered a global city and has a population larger than other countries in the United Kingdom besides England itself. Other urban areas of considerable size and influence tend to be in northern England or the English Midlands. There are fifty settlements which have been designated city status in England, while the wider United Kingdom has sixty-six.

While many cities in England are quite large in size, such as Birmingham, Sheffield, Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Newcastle, Bradford, Nottingham and others, a large population is not necessarily a prerequisite for a settlement to be afforded city status. Traditionally the status was afforded to towns with diocesan cathedrals and so there are smaller cities like Wells, Ely, Ripon, Truro and Chichester. According to the Office for National Statistics the ten largest, continuous built-up urban areas are: {| style="width:100%;" class="wikitable" |- ! style="width:5%;"| Rank ! style="width:30%;"| Urban area ! style="width:15%;"| Population ! style="width:5%;"| Localities ! style="width:45%;"| Major localities |- style="text-align:center;" ||1 || style="text-align:center;"|Greater London Urban Area || style="text-align:center;"|8,278,251|| 67 || style="text-align:center;"|Greater London, divided into the City of London and 32 London boroughs including Croydon, Barnet, Ealing, Bromley |- style="text-align:center;" ||2 || style="text-align:center;"|West Midlands Urban Area || style="text-align:center;"|2,284,093 || 22 || style="text-align:center;"|Birmingham, Wolverhampton, Dudley, Walsall |- style="text-align:center;" ||3 || style="text-align:center;"|Greater Manchester Urban Area || style="text-align:center;"|2,240,230 || 57 || style="text-align:center;"|Manchester, Salford, Bolton, Stockport, Oldham |- style="text-align:center;" ||4 || style="text-align:center;"|West Yorkshire Urban Area || style="text-align:center;"|1,499,465 || 26 || style="text-align:center;"|Leeds, Bradford, Huddersfield, Wakefield, Halifax |- style="text-align:center;" ||5 || style="text-align:center;"|Tyneside || style="text-align:center;"|879,996 ||25 || style="text-align:center;"|Newcastle, North Shields, South Shields, Gateshead, Jarrow |- style="text-align:center;" ||6 || style="text-align:center;"|Liverpool Urban Area || style="text-align:center;"|816,216 || 8 || style="text-align:center;"|Liverpool, St Helens, Bootle, Huyton-with-Roby |- style="text-align:center;" ||7 || style="text-align:center;"|Nottingham Urban Area || style="text-align:center;"|666,358 || 15 || style="text-align:center;"|Nottingham, Beeston and Stapleford, Carlton, Long Eaton |- style="text-align:center;" ||8 || style="text-align:center;"|Sheffield Urban Area || style="text-align:center;"|640,720 || 7 || style="text-align:center;"|Sheffield, Rotherham, Chapeltown, Mosborough |- style="text-align:center;" ||9 || style="text-align:center;"|Bristol Urban Area || style="text-align:center;"| 551,066 || 7 || style="text-align:center;"|Bristol, Kingswood, Mangotsfield, Stoke Gifford |- style="text-align:center;" ||10 || style="text-align:center;"|Brighton/Worthing/Littlehampton || style="text-align:center;"| 461,181 || 10 || style="text-align:center;"|Brighton, Worthing, Hove, Littlehampton, Shoreham, Lancing |}

Economy

England's economy is one of the largest in the world, with an average GDP per capita of £22,907. Usually regarded as a mixed market economy, it has adopted many free market principles, yet maintains an advanced social welfare infrastructure. The official currency in England is the pound sterling, whose ISO 4217 code is GBP. Taxation in England is quite competitive when compared to much of the rest of Europe—as of 2009 the basic rate of personal tax is 20% on taxable income up to £37,400, and 40% on any additional earnings above that amount.

The economy of England is the largest part of the UK's economy, which has the 18th highest GDP PPP per capita in the world. England is a leader in the chemical and pharmaceutical sectors and in key technical industries, particularly aerospace, the arms industry, and the manufacturing side of the software industry. London, home to the London Stock Exchange, the United Kingdom's main stock exchange and the largest in Europe, is England's financial centre—100 of Europe's 500 largest corporations are based in London. London is the largest financial centre in Europe, and as of 2009 is also the largest in the world.

The Bank of England, founded in 1694 by Scottish banker William Paterson, is the United Kingdom's central bank. Originally established as private banker to the Government of England, it carried on in this role as part of the United Kingdom—since 1946 it has been a state-owned institution. The Bank has a monopoly on the issue of banknotes in England and Wales, although not in other parts of the United Kingdom. The government has devolved responsibility to the Bank's Monetary Policy Committee for managing the monetary policy of the country and setting interest rates.

England is highly industrialised, but since the 1970s there has been a decline in traditional heavy and manufacturing industries, and an increasing emphasis on a more service industry oriented economy. Tourism has become a significant industry, attracting millions of visitors to England each year. The export part of the economy is dominated by pharmaceuticals, automobiles—although many English marques are now foreign-owned, such as Rolls-Royce, Lotus, Jaguar and Bentley—crude oil and petroleum from the English parts of North Sea oil along with Wytch Farm, aircraft engines and alcoholic beverages. Agriculture is intensive and highly mechanised, producing 60% of food needs with only 2% of the labour force. Two thirds of production is devoted to livestock, the other to arable crops.

Science and technology

Prominent English figures from the field of science and mathematics include Sir Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, Robert Hooke, Robert Boyle, Joseph Priestley, J. J. Thomson, Charles Babbage, Charles Darwin, Stephen Hawking, Christopher Wren, Alan Turing, Francis Crick, Joseph Lister, Tim Berners-Lee, Paul Dirac, Andrew Wiles and Richard Dawkins. Some experts claim that the earliest concept of a metric system was invented by John Wilkins, the first secretary of the Royal Society, in 1668. As the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution, England was home to many significant inventors during the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Famous English engineers include Isambard Kingdom Brunel, best known for the creation of the Great Western Railway, a series of famous steamships, and numerous important bridges, hence revolutionising public transport and modern-day engineering. Thomas Newcomen's steam engine helped spawn the Industrial Revolution. The physician Edward Jenner's smallpox vaccine is said to have "saved more lives [...] than were lost in all the wars of mankind since the beginning of recorded history."

Inventions and discoveries of the English include: the jet engine, the first industrial spinning machine, the first computer and the first modern computer, the World Wide Web along with HTTP and HTML, the first successful human blood transfusion, the motorised vacuum cleaner, the lawn mower, the seat belt, the hovercraft, the electric motor, steam engines, and theories such as the Darwinian theory of evolution and atomic theory. Newton developed the ideas of universal gravitation, Newtonian mechanics, and infinitesimal calculus, and Robert Hooke his eponymously named law of elasticity. Other inventions include the iron plate railway, the thermosiphon, tarmac, the rubber band, the mousetrap, "cat's eye" road safety device, joint development of the light bulb, steam locomotives, the modern seed drill and many modern techniques and technologies used in precision engineering.

Transport

The Department for Transport is the government body responsible for overseeing transport in England. There are many motorways in England, and many other trunk roads, such as the A1 Great North Road, which runs through eastern England from London to Newcastle (much of this section is motorway) and onward to the Scottish border. The longest motorway in England is the M6, from Rugby through the North West up to the Anglo-Scottish border. Other major routes include: the M1 from London to Leeds, the M25 which encircles London, the M60 which encircles Manchester, the M4 from London to South Wales, the M62 from Liverpool via Manchester to East Yorkshire, and the M5 from Birmingham to Bristol and the South West.

Bus transport across the country is widespread; major companies include National Express, Arriva and Go-Ahead Group. The red double-decker buses in London have become a symbol of England. There is a rapid rail network in two English cities: the London Underground; and the Tyne and Wear Metro in Newcastle, Gateshead and Sunderland. There are several tram networks, such as the Blackpool tramway, Manchester Metrolink, Sheffield Supertram and Midland Metro, and the Tramlink system centred on Croydon in South London.

Rail transport in England is the oldest in the world: passenger railways originated in England in 1825. Much of Britain's of rail network lies in England, covering the country fairly extensively, although a high proportion of railway lines were closed in the second half of the 20th century. These lines are mostly standard gauge (single, double or quadruple track) though there are also a few narrow gauge lines. There is rail transport access to France and Belgium through an undersea rail link, the Channel Tunnel, which was completed in 1994.

England has extensive domestic and international aviation links. The largest airport is London Heathrow, which is the world's busiest airport measured by number of international passengers. Other large airports include Manchester Airport, London Stansted Airport, Luton Airport and Birmingham Airport. By sea there is ferry transport, both local and international, including to Ireland, the Netherlands and Belgium. There are around of navigable waterways in England, half of which is owned by British Waterways (Waterscape), however water transport is very limited. The Thames is the major waterway in England, with imports and exports focused at the Port of Tilbury in the Thames Estuary, one of the United Kingdom's three major ports.

Healthcare

The National Health Service (NHS) is the publicly funded healthcare system in England responsible for providing the majority of healthcare in the country. The NHS began on 5 July 1948, putting into effect the provisions of the National Health Service Act 1946. It was based on the findings of the Beveridge Report, prepared by economist and social reformer William Beveridge. The NHS is largely funded from general taxation including National Insurance payments, and it provides most of its services free at the point of use, although there are charges for some people for eye tests, dental care, prescriptions and aspects of personal care.

The government department responsible for the NHS is the Department of Health, headed by the Secretary of State for Health, who sits in the British Cabinet. Most of the expenditure of the Department of Health is spent on the NHS—£98.6 billion was spent in 2008–2009. In recent years the private sector has been increasingly used to provide more NHS services despite opposition by doctors and trade unions. The average life expectancy of people in England is 77.5 years for males and 81.7 years for females, the highest of the four countries of the United Kingdom.

Demography

Population

With over 51 million inhabitants, England is by far the most populous country of the United Kingdom, accounting for 84% of the combined total. England taken as a unit and measured against international states has the fourth largest population in the European Union and would be the 25th largest country by population in the world. With a density of 395 people per square kilometre, it would be the second most densely populated country in the European Union after Malta.

The English people are a British people. Some genetic evidence suggests that 75–95% descend in the paternal line from prehistoric settlers who originally came from the Iberian Peninsula, as well as a 5% contribution from Angles and Saxons, and a significant Norse element. However, other geneticists place the Norse-Germanic estimate up to half. Over time, various cultures have been influential: Prehistoric, Brythonic, Roman, Anglo-Saxon, Norse Viking, Gaelic cultures, as well as a large influence from Normans. There is an English diaspora in former parts of the British Empire; especially the United States, Canada, Australia, Chile, South Africa and New Zealand. In Canada there are around 6.5 million Canadians who claim English ancestry. Around 70% of Australians in 1999 denoted their origins as Anglo-Celtic, a category which includes all peoples from Great Britain and Ireland. Chileans of English descent are somewhat of an anomaly in that Chile itself was never part of the British Empire, but today there are around 420,000 people of English origins living there. |group=note}} Since the late 1990s, English people have migrated to Spain. At the time of the ''Domesday Book'', compiled in 1086, more than 90% of the English population of about two million lived in the countryside. By 1801 the population had grown to 8.3 million, and by 1901 had grown to 30.5 million. Due in particular to the economic prosperity of South East England, there are many economic migrants from the other parts of the United Kingdom. There has been significant Irish migration. The proportion of ethnically European residents totals at 87.50%, including Germans and Poles.

Other people from much further afield in the former British colonies have arrived since the 1950s: in particular, 6.00% of people living in England have family origins in the Indian subcontinent, mostly India and Pakistan. 2.90% of the population are black, mostly from the Caribbean. There is a significant number of Chinese and British Chinese. As of 2007, 22% of primary school children in England were from ethnic minority families. About half of the population increase between 1991 and 2001 was due to immigration. Debate over immigration is politically prominent; according to a Home Office poll, 80% of people want to cap it. The ONS has projected that the population will grow by six million between 2004 and 2029.

Language

As its name suggests, the English language, today spoken by hundreds of millions of people around the world, originated as the language of England, where it remains the principal tongue today. It is an Indo-European language in the Anglo-Frisian branch of the Germanic family. After the Norman conquest, the Old English language was displaced and confined to the lower social classes as Norman French and Latin were used by the aristocracy.

By the 15th century, English came back into fashion among all classes, though much changed; the Middle English form showed many signs of French influence, both in vocabulary and spelling. During the English Renaissance, many words were coined from Latin and Greek origins. Modern English has extended this custom of flexibility, when it comes to incorporating words from different languages. Thanks in large part to the British Empire, the English language is the world's unofficial ''lingua franca''.

English language learning and teaching is an important economic activity, and includes language schooling, tourism spending, and publishing. There is no legislation mandating an official language for England, but English is the only language used for official business. Despite the country's relatively small size, there are many distinct regional accents, and individuals with particularly strong accents may not be easily understood everywhere in the country.

Cornish, which died out as a community language in the 18th century, is being revived, and is now protected under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. It is spoken by 0.1% of people in Cornwall, and is taught to some degree in several primary and secondary schools. State schools teach students a second language, usually French, German or Spanish. Due to immigration, it was reported in 2007 that around 800,000 school students spoke a foreign language at home, the most common being Punjabi and Urdu.

Religion

Christianity is the most widely practised religion in England, as it has been since the Early Middle Ages, although it was first introduced much earlier, in Gaelic and Roman times. It continued through Early Insular Christianity, and today about 72% of English people identify as Christians. The largest form practised in the present day is Anglicanism, dating from the 16th century Reformation period, with the 1536 split from Rome over Henry VIII wanting to divorce Catherine of Aragon; the religion regards itself as both Catholic and Reformed.

There are High Church and Low Church traditions, and some Anglicans regard themselves as Anglo-Catholics, after the Tractarian movement. The monarch of the United Kingdom is the head of the Church, acting as its Supreme Governor. It has the status of established church in England. There are around 26 million adherents to the Church of England and they form part of the Anglican Communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury acting as the symbolic worldwide head. Many cathedrals and parish churches are historic buildings of significant architectural importance, such as Westminster Abbey, York Minster, Durham Cathedral and Salisbury Cathedral.

The second largest Christian practice is the Latin Rite of the Catholic Church, which traces its formal, corporate history in England to the 6th century with Augustine's mission and was the main religion on the entire island for around a thousand years. Since its reintroduction after the Catholic Emancipation, the Church has organised ecclesiastically on an England and Wales basis where there are 4.5 million members (most of whom are English). There has been one Pope from England to date, Adrian IV; while saints Bede and Anselm are regarded as Doctors of the Church.

A form of Protestantism known as Methodism is the third largest and grew out of Anglicanism through John Wesley. It gained popularity in the mill towns of Lancashire and Yorkshire, and amongst tin miners in Cornwall. There are other non-conformist minorities, such as Baptists, Quakers, Congregationalists, Unitarians and The Salvation Army.

The patron saint of England is Saint George; he is represented in the national flag, as well as the Union Flag as part of a combination. There are many other English and associated saints; some of the best known include: Cuthbert, Alban, Wilfrid, Aidan, Edward the Confessor, John Fisher, Thomas More, Petroc, Piran, Margaret Clitherow and Thomas Becket. There are non-Christian religions practised. Jews have a history of a small minority on the island since 1070. They were expelled from England in 1290 following the Edict of Expulsion, only to be allowed back in 1656.

Especially since the 1950s, Eastern religions from the former British colonies have begun to appear, due to foreign immigration; Islam is the most common of these, accounting for around 3.1% in England. Hinduism, Sikhism and Buddhism are next in number, adding up to 2% combined, introduced from India and South East Asia. Around 14.6% claim to have no religion.

Education

The Department for Education is the government department responsible for issues affecting people in England up to the age of 19, including education. State-run and -funded schools are attended by approximately 93% of English schoolchildren. Of these, a minority are faith schools, primarily Church of England or Catholic. Between three and four is nursery school, 4 and 11 is primary school, and 11 to 16 is secondary school, with an option for a two-year extension to attend sixth form college.

Although most English secondary schools are comprehensive, in some areas there are selective intake grammar schools, to which entrance is subject to passing the eleven plus exam. Around 7.2% of English schoolchildren attend private schools, which are funded by private sources. Standards in state schools are monitored by the Office for Standards in Education, and in private schools by the Independent Schools Inspectorate.

After finishing compulsory education, pupils take a GCSE examination, following which they may decide to continue in further education and attend a further education college. Students normally enter universities in the United Kingdom from 18 onwards, where they study for an academic degree. There are over 90 universities England, all but one of which are public. The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills is the government department responsible for higher education in England. Students are generally entitled to student loans for maintenance. The first degree offered to undergraduates is the Bachelor's degree, which usually takes three years to complete. Students are then eligible for a postgraduate degree, a Master's degree, taking one year, or a Doctorate degree, which takes three.

England's universities include some of the highest-ranked universities in the world; the University of Cambridge, Imperial College London, the University of Oxford and University College London are all ranked in the global top 10 in the 2010 ''QS World University Rankings''. The London School of Economics has been described as the world's leading social science institution for both teaching and research. The London Business School is considered one of the world's leading business schools and in 2010 its MBA programme was ranked best in the world by the ''Financial Times''. Academic degrees in England are usually split into classes: first class (I), upper second class (II:1), lower second class (II:2) and third (III), and unclassified (below third class).

The King's School, Canterbury and King's School, Rochester are the oldest schools in the English-speaking world. Many of England's better-known schools, such as Winchester College, Eton College, St Paul's School, Rugby School, and Harrow School are fee-paying institutions.

Culture

Architecture

Many ancient standing stone monuments were erected during the prehistoric period, amongst the best known are Stonehenge, Devil's Arrows, Rudston Monolith and Castlerigg. With the introduction of Ancient Roman architecture there was a development of basilicas, baths, amphitheaters, triumphal arches, villas, Roman temples, Roman roads, Roman forts, stockades and aqueducts. It was the Romans who founded the first cities and towns such as London, Bath, York, Chester and St Albans. Perhaps the best known example is Hadrian's Wall stretching right across northern England. Another well preserved example is the Roman Baths at Bath, Somerset.

Early Medieval architecture's secular buildings were simple constructions mainly using timber with thatch for roofing. Ecclesiastical architecture ranged from a synthesis of Hiberno—Saxon monasticism, to Early Christian basilica and architecture characterised by pilaster-strips, blank arcading, baluster shafts and triangular headed openings. After the Norman conquest in 1066 various Castles in England were created so law lords could uphold their authority and in the north to protect from invasion. Some of the best known medieval castles include the Tower of London, Warwick Castle, Durham Castle and Windsor Castle amongst others.

Throughout the Plantagenet era an English Gothic architecture flourished—the medieval cathedrals such as Canterbury Cathedral, Westminster Abbey and York Minster are prime examples. Expanding on the Norman base there was also castles, palaces, great houses, universities and parish churches. Medieval architecture was completed with the 16th century Tudor style; the four-centred arch, now known as the Tudor arch, was a defining feature as were wattle and daub houses domestically. In the aftermath of the Renaissance a form of architecture echoing classical antiquity, synthesised with Christianity appeared—the English Baroque style, architect Christopher Wren was particularly championed.

Georgian architecture followed in a more refined style, evoking a simple Palladian form; the Royal Crescent at Bath is one of the best examples of this. With the emergence of romanticism during Victorian period, a Gothic Revival was launched—in addition to this around the same time the Industrial Revolution paved the way for buildings such as The Crystal Palace. Since the 1930s various modernist forms have appeared whose reception is often controversial, though traditionalist resistance movements continue with support in influential places. Architects like Raymond Erith, Francis Johnson and Quinlan Terry continued to practice in the classical style.|group=note}}

Folklore

English folklore developed over many centuries. Some of the characters and stories are present across England, but most belong to specific regions. Common folkloric beings include pixies, giants, elfs, bogeymen, trolls, goblins and dwarves. While many legends and folk-customs are thought to be ancient, for instance the tales featuring Offa of Angel and Wayland the Smith, others date from after the Norman invasion; Robin Hood and his Merry Men of Sherwood and their battles with the Sheriff of Nottingham being, perhaps, the best known.

During the High Middle Ages tales originating from Brythonic traditions entered English folklore—the Arthurian myth. These were derived from Anglo-Norman, French and Welsh sources, featuring King Arthur, Camelot, Excalibur, Merlin and the Knights of the Round Table such as Lancelot. These stories are most centrally brought together within Geoffrey of Monmouth's ''Historia Regum Britanniae''.. Also Michael Wood explains; "Over the centuries the figure of Arthur became a symbol of British history—a way of explaining the matter of Britain, the relationship between the Saxons and the Celts, and a way of exorcising ghosts and healing the wounds of the past."|group=note}} Another early figure from British tradition, King Cole, may have been based on a real figure from Sub-Roman Britain. Many of the tales and pseudo-histories make up part of the wider Matter of Britain, a collection of shared British folklore.

Some folk figures are based on semi or actual historical people whose story has been passed down centuries; Lady Godiva for instance was said to have ridden naked on horseback through Coventry, Hereward the Wake was a heroic English figure resisting the Norman invasion, Herne the Hunter is an equestrian ghost associated with Windsor Forest and Great Park and Mother Shipton is the archetypal witch. On 5 November people make bonfires, set off fireworks and eat toffee apples in commemoration of the foiling of the Gunpowder Plot centred around Guy Fawkes. The chivalrous bandit, such as Dick Turpin, is a recurring character, while Blackbeard is the archetypal pirate. There are various national and regional folk activities, participated in to this day, such as Morris dancing, Maypole dancing, Rapper sword in the North East, Long Sword dance in Yorkshire, Mummers Plays, bottle-kicking in Leicestershire, and cheese-rolling at Cooper's Hill. There is no official national costume, but a few are well established such as the Pearly Kings and Queens associated with cockneys, the Royal Guard, the Morris costume and Beefeaters.

Cuisine

Since the Early Modern Period the food of England has historically been characterised by its simplicity of approach, honesty of flavour, and a reliance on the high quality of natural produce. During the Middle Ages and through the Renaissance period, English cuisine enjoyed an excellent reputation, though a decline began during the Industrial Revolution with the move away from the land and increasing urbanisation of the populace. The French sometimes referred to English people as ''les rosbifs'', as a stereotype to suggest that English food is unsophisticated or crude. The cuisine of England has, however, recently undergone a revival, which has been recognised by the food critics with some good ratings in ''Restaurant'''s best restaurant in the world charts. An early book of English recipes is the ''Forme of Cury'' from the royal court of Richard II.

Traditional examples of English food include the Sunday roast, featuring a roasted joint, usually beef, lamb or chicken, served with assorted boiled vegetables, Yorkshire pudding and gravy. Other prominent meals include fish and chips and the full English breakfast—consisting of bacon, grilled tomatoes, fried bread, black pudding, baked beans, fried mushrooms, sausages and eggs. Various meat pies are consumed such as steak and kidney pie, cottage pie, Cornish pasty and pork pie, the last of which is eaten cold.

Sausages are commonly eaten, either as bangers and mash or toad in the hole. Lancashire hotpot is a well known stew. Some of the most popular cheeses are Cheddar and Wensleydale. Many Anglo-Indian hybrid dishes, curries, have been created such as chicken tikka masala and balti. Sweet English dishes include apple pie, mince pies, spotted dick, scones, Eccles cakes, custard and sticky toffee pudding. Common drinks include tea, whose popularity was increased by Catherine of Braganza, while alcoholic drinks include wines and English beers such as bitter, mild, stout, and brown ale.

Visual arts

The earliest known examples are the prehistoric rock and cave art pieces, most prominent in North Yorkshire, Northumberland and Cumbria, but also feature further south, for example at Creswell Crags. With the arrival of Roman culture in the 1st century, various forms of art utilising statues, busts, glasswork and mosaics were the norm. There are numerous surviving artefacts, such as those at Lullingstone and Aldborough. During the Early Middle Ages the style was sculpted crosses and ivories, manuscript painting, gold and enamel jewellery, demonstrating a love of intricate, interwoven designs such as in the Staffordshire Hoard discovered in 2009. Some of these blended Gaelic and Anglian styles, such as the Lindisfarne Gospels and Vespasian Psalter. Later Gothic art was popular at Winchester and Canterbury, examples survive such as Benedictional of St. Æthelwold and Luttrell Psalter.

The Tudor era saw prominent artists as part of their court, portrait painting which would remain an enduring part of English art, was boosted by German Hans Holbein, natives such as Nicholas Hilliard built on this. Under the Stuarts, Continental artists were influential especially the Flemish, examples from the period include—Anthony van Dyck, Peter Lely, Godfrey Kneller and William Dobson. The 18th century was a time of significance with the founding of the Royal Academy, a classicism based on the High Renaissance prevailed—Thomas Gainsborough and Joshua Reynolds became two of England's most treasured artists.

The Norwich School continued the landscape tradition, while the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood with their vivid and detailed style revived the Early Renaissance style—Holman Hunt, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and John Everett Millais were leaders. Prominent amongst 20th century artists was Henry Moore, regarded as the voice of British sculpture, and of British modernism in general. Contemporary painters include Lucian Freud, whose work ''Benefits Supervisor Sleeping'' in 2008 set a world record for sale value of a painting by a living artist.

Literature, poetry and philosophy

Early authors such as Bede and Alcuin wrote in Latin. The period of Old English literature provided the epic poem ''Beowulf'' and the secular prose of the ''Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'', along with Christian writings such as ''Judith'', Cædmon's ''Hymn'' and hagiographies. Following the Norman conquest Latin continued amongst the educated classes, as well as an Anglo-Norman literature.

Middle English literature emerged with Geoffrey Chaucer, author of ''The Canterbury Tales'', along with Gower, the Pearl Poet and Langland. William of Ockham and Roger Bacon, who were Franciscans, were major philosophers of the Middle Ages. Julian of Norwich, who wrote ''Revelations of Divine Love'', was a prominent Christian mystic. With the English Renaissance literature in the Early Modern English style appeared. William Shakespeare, whose works include ''Hamlet'', ''Romeo and Juliet'', ''Macbeth'', and ''A Midsummer Night's Dream'', remains one of the most championed authors in English literature.

Christopher Marlowe, Edmund Spenser, Philip Sydney, Thomas Kyd, John Donne, and Ben Jonson are other established authors of the Elizabethan age. Francis Bacon and Thomas Hobbes wrote on empiricism and materialism, including scientific method and social contract. Filmer wrote on the Divine Right of Kings. Marvell was the best known poet of the Commonwealth, while John Milton authored ''Paradise Lost'' during the Restoration. Some of the most prominent philosophers of the Enlightenment were John Locke, Thomas Paine, Samuel Johnson and Jeremy Bentham. More radical elements were later countered by Edmund Burke who is regarded as the founder of conservatism. The poet Alexander Pope with his satirical verse became well regarded. The English played a significant role in romanticism: Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Lord Byron, John Keats, Mary Shelley, Percy Bysshe Shelley, William Blake and William Wordsworth were major figures.

In response to the Industrial Revolution, agrarian writers sought a way between liberty and tradition; William Cobbett, G. K. Chesterton and Hilaire Belloc were main exponents, while the founder of guild socialism, Arthur Penty, and cooperative movement advocate G. D. H. Cole are somewhat related. Empiricism continued through John Stuart Mill and Bertrand Russell, while Bernard Williams was involved in analytics. Authors from around the Victorian era include Charles Dickens, the Brontë sisters, Jane Austen, George Eliot, Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy, H. G. Wells, Lewis Carroll and Evelyn Underhill. Since then England has continued to produce novelists such as C. S. Lewis, George Orwell, D. H. Lawrence, Virginia Woolf, Enid Blyton, Aldous Huxley, Agatha Christie, Terry Pratchett, J. R. R. Tolkien, and J. K. Rowling.

Performing arts

The traditional folk music of England is centuries old and has contributed to several genres prominently; mostly sea shanties, jigs, hornpipes and dance music. It has its own distinct variations and regional peculiarities. Wynkyn de Worde printed ballads of Robin Hood from the 16th century are an important artefact, as are John Playford's ''The Dancing Master'' and Robert Harley's ''Roxburghe Ballads'' collections. Some of the best known songs are ''The Good Old Way'', ''Pastime with Good Company'', ''Maggie May'' and ''Spanish Ladies'' amongst others. Many nursery rhymes are of English origin such as ''Twinkle Twinkle Little Star'', ''Roses are red'', ''Jack and Jill'', ''Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush'' and ''Humpty Dumpty''.

Early English composers in classical music include Renaissance artists Thomas Tallis and William Byrd, followed up by Henry Purcell from the Baroque period. German-born George Frideric Handel became a British subject and spent most of his composing life in London, creating some of the most well-known works of classical music, ''The Messiah'', ''Water Music'', and ''Music for the Royal Fireworks''. There was a revival in the profile of composers from England in the 20th century led by Benjamin Britten, Frederick Delius, Edward Elgar, Gustav Holst, Ralph Vaughan Williams and others. Present-day composers from England include Michael Nyman, best known for ''The Piano''.

In the field of popular music many English bands and solo artists have been cited as the most influential and best-selling musicians of all time. Acts such as The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Elton John, Queen, Rod Stewart and The Rolling Stones are among the highest selling recording artists in the world. Many musical genres have origins or strong associations with England, such as British invasion, hard rock, glam rock, heavy metal, mod, britpop, drum and bass, progressive rock, punk rock, indie rock, gothic rock, shoegazing, acid house, UK garage, trip hop and dubstep.

Large outdoor music festivals in the summer and autumn are popular, such as Glastonbury, V Festival, Reading and Leeds Festivals. The most prominent opera house in England is the Royal Opera House at Covent Garden. The Proms, a season of orchestral classical music concerts held at the Royal Albert Hall, is a major cultural event held annually. The Royal Ballet is one of the world's foremost classical ballet companies, its reputation built on two prominent figures of 20th century dance, ''prima ballerina'' Margot Fonteyn and choreographer Frederick Ashton.

Museums, libraries, and galleries

English Heritage is a governmental body with a broad remit of managing the historic sites, artefacts and environments of England. It is currently sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. The charity National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty holds a contrasting role. 17 of the 25 United Kingdom UNESCO World Heritage Sites fall within England. Some of the best known of these include; Hadrian's Wall, Stonehenge, Avebury and Associated Sites, Tower of London, Jurassic Coast, Saltaire, Ironbridge Gorge, Studley Royal Park and various others.

There are many museums in England, but the most notable is London's British Museum. Its collection of more than seven million objects is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the world, sourced from every continent, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its beginning to the present. The British Library in London is the national library and is one of the world's largest research libraries, holding over 150 million items in all known languages and formats; including around 25 million books. The most senior art gallery is the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square, which houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The Tate galleries house the national collections of British and international modern art; they also host the famously controversial Turner Prize.

Sports

England has a strong sporting heritage, and during the 19th century codified many sports that are now played around the world. Sports originating in England include association football, cricket, rugby union, rugby league, tennis, badminton, squash, rounders, hockey, boxing, snooker, billiards, darts, table tennis, bowls, netball, thoroughbred horseracing and fox hunting. It has helped the development of sailing and Formula One. Football is the most popular of these sports. The England national football team, whose home venue is Wembley Stadium, won the 1966 FIFA World Cup, the year the country hosted the competition.

At club level England is recognised by FIFA as the birth-place of club football, due to Sheffield FC founded in 1857 being the oldest club. The Football Association is the oldest of its kind, FA Cup and The Football League were the first cup and league competitions respectively. In the modern day the Premier League is the world's most lucrative football league and amongst the elite. The European Cup has been won by Liverpool, Manchester United, Nottingham Forest and Aston Villa, while Arsenal, Chelsea and Leeds United have reached the final.

Cricket is generally thought to have been developed in the early medieval period among the farming and metalworking communities of the Weald. The England cricket team is a composite England and Wales team. One of the game's top rivalries is The Ashes series between England and Australia, contested since 1882. The finale of the 2009 Ashes was watched by nearly 2 million people, although the climax of the 2005 Ashes was viewed by 7.4 million as it was available on terrestrial television. England are the current holders of the trophy and are fifth in both Test and One Day International cricket.

England has hosted four Cricket World Cups (1975, 1979, 1983, 1999) and the ICC World Twenty20 in 2009. There are several domestic level competitions, including the County Championship in which Yorkshire are by far the most successful club having won the competition 31 times. Lord's Cricket Ground situated in London is sometimes referred to as the "Mecca of Cricket". William Penny Brookes was prominent in organising the format for the modern Olympic Games. London hosted the Summer Olympic Games in 1908 and 1948, and will host them again in 2012. England competes in the Commonwealth Games, held every four years. Sport England is the governing body responsible for distributing funds and providing strategic guidance for sporting activity in England. A Grand Prix is held at Silverstone.

The England rugby union team won the 2003 Rugby World Cup, the country was one of the host nations of the competition in the 1991 Rugby World Cup and is set to host the 2015 Rugby World Cup. The top level of club participation is the English Premiership. Leicester Tigers, London Wasps, Bath Rugby and Northampton Saints have had success in the Europe-wide Heineken Cup. In another form of the sport—rugby league which was born in Huddersfield in 1895, the England national rugby league team are ranked third in the world and first in Europe.

Since 2008 England has been a full test nation in lieu of the Great Britain national rugby league team, which won three World Cups but is now retired. Club sides play in Super League, the present-day embodiment of the Rugby Football League Championship. Some of the most successful clubs include Wigan Warriors, St Helens, Leeds Rhinos and Huddersfield Giants; the former three have all won the World Club Challenge previously. The United Kingdom is to host the 2013 Rugby League World Cup. In tennis, the Wimbledon Championships are the oldest tennis tournament in the world and is widely considered the most prestigious.

National symbols

The St George's Cross has been the national flag of England since the 13th century. Originally the flag was used by the maritime Republic of Genoa. The English monarch paid a tribute to the Doge of Genoa from 1190 onwards, so that English ships could fly the flag as a means of protection when entering the Mediterranean. A red cross was a symbol for many Crusaders in the 12th and 13th centuries. It became associated with Saint George, along with countries and cities, which claimed him as their patron saint and used his cross as a banner. Since 1606 the St George's Cross has formed part of the design of the Union Flag, a Pan-British flag designed by King James I. There are numerous other symbols and symbolic artefacts, both official and unofficial, including the Tudor rose, the nation's floral emblem, the White Dragon, and the Three Lions featured on the Royal Arms of England. The Tudor rose was adopted as a national emblem of England around the time of the Wars of the Roses as a symbol of peace. It is a syncretic symbol in that it merged the white rose of the Yorkists and the red rose of the Lancastrians—cadet branches of the Plantagenets who went to war over control of the nation. It is also known as the ''Rose of England''. The oak tree is a symbol of England, representing strength and endurance. The term Royal Oak alludes to the escape of King Charles II from the grasp of the parliamentarians after his father's execution: he hid in an oak tree to avoid detection before safely reaching exile.

The Royal Arms of England, a national coat of arms featuring three lions, originated with its adoption by Richard the Lionheart in 1198. It is blazoned as ''gules, three lions passant guardant or'' and it provides one of the most prominent symbols of England; it is similar to the traditional arms of Normandy. England does not have an official designated national anthem, as the United Kingdom as a whole has ''God Save the Queen''. However, the following are often considered unofficial English national anthems: ''Jerusalem'', ''Land of Hope and Glory'' (used for England during the 2002 Commonwealth Games), and ''I Vow to Thee, My Country''. England's National Day is 23 April which is St George's Day: St George is the patron saint of England.

See also

Notes

References

Bibliographic

External links

Official website of the United Kingdom Government

English Heritage  – national body protecting English heritage

Natural England  – wildlife and the natural world of England

Enjoy England  – website of the English Tourist Board

BBC England  – news items from the BBC relating to England

England Category:English-speaking countries and territories Category:Northern Europe Category:Western Europe Category:Island countries Category:Great Britain

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{|class="infobox" border="1" cellpadding="4" style="width: 300px; border-collapse:collapse; font-size: 95%;" |- |+ style="font-size: larger;"|New England |- | colspan="2" style="text-align:center; background:#fff;"| |- ! colspan=2|Regional statistics |- |Composition | Connecticut Maine Massachusetts New Hampshire Rhode Island Vermont |- style="vertical-align: bottom;" |Demonym |New Englander, Yankee |- |Area - Total |71,991.8 sq mi (186,458.8 km²)(Slightly larger than Washington.) |- style="vertical-align: bottom;" |Population - Total - Density |14,429,720 (2009 est.)198.2/sq mi (87.7/km²) |- |Largest city |[[Boston, |GDP |$763.7 billion (2007) |- |HDI |5.7 (1st) (2011) |- |Largest Metropolitan Area |Boston-Cambridge-Quincy (pop. 4,522,858) |}

New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. New England is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean, Canada (the Canadian Maritimes and Quebec) and the State of New York.

In one of the earliest English settlements in North America, Pilgrims from England first settled in New England in 1620, to form Plymouth Colony. Ten years later, the Puritans settled north of Plymouth Colony in Boston, thus forming Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630. Over the next 130 years, New England participated in four French and Indian Wars, until the British defeated the French and their native allies in North America. In the late 18th century, the New England Colonies initiated the resistance to the British Parliament's efforts to impose new taxes without the consent of the colonists. The Boston Tea Party was a protest that angered Great Britain, which responded with the Coercive Acts, stripping the colonies of self-government. The confrontation led to open warfare in 1775, the expulsion of the British from New England in spring 1776, and the Declaration of Independence in July 1776.

The first movements of American literature, philosophy, and education originated in New England. The region played a prominent role in the movement to abolish slavery and was the first region of the United States to be transformed by the Industrial Revolution. Today, New England is a major world center of education, high technology, insurance, and medicine. Boston is its cultural, financial, educational, medical and transportation center.

Locally, each state is subdivided into small incorporated municipalities known as New England towns, which are often governed by town meeting. Voters have voted more often for liberal candidates at the state and federal level than those of any other region in the United States.

New England has the only non-geographic regional name recognized by the federal government. It maintains a strong sense of cultural identity set apart from the rest of the country, although the terms of this identity are often contested, paradoxically combining Puritanism with liberalism, agrarian life with industry, and isolation with immigration.

History

Eastern Algonquian peoples

The earliest known inhabitants of New England were Native Americans who spoke a variety of the Eastern Algonquian languages. Some of the more prominent tribes include the Abenaki, the Penobscot, the Pequot, the Mohegans, the Pocumtuck, and the Wampanoag. Prior to the arrival of Europeans, the Western Abenakis inhabited New Hampshire and Vermont, as well as parts of Quebec and western Maine. Their principal town was Norridgewock, in present-day Maine. The Penobscot were settled along the Penobscot River in Maine. The Wampanoag occupied southeastern Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and the islands of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket; the Pocumtucks, Western Massachusetts. The Connecticut region was inhabited by the Mohegan and Pequot tribes prior to European colonization. The Connecticut River Valley, which includes parts of Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Connecticut, linked different indigenous communities in cultural, linguistic, and political ways.

According to archaeological evidence, the indigenous people of the warmer parts of Southern New England had started agricultural endeavors over a thousand years ago. They grew corn, tobacco, kidney beans, squash, and Jerusalem artichoke. Trade with the Algonquian peoples of Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine, where the growing season was shorter, likely provided for a robust economy.

As early as 1600, French, Dutch, and English traders, exploring the New World, began to trade metal, glass, and cloth for local beaver pelts.

The Virginia Companies compete

On April 10, 1606, King James I of England issued two charters, one for each of the Virginia Companies, London and Plymouth. Due to a duplication of territory (between Chesapeake Bay and Long Island Sound), the two companies were required to maintain a separation of , even where the two charters overlapped.

These were privately-funded proprietary ventures, and the purpose of each was to claim land for England, trade, and return a profit. The London Company was authorized to make settlements from North Carolina to New York (31 to 41 degrees North Latitude), provided there was no conflict with the Plymouth Company’s charter.

The Popham Colony was planted at the mouth of the Kennebec River in Maine by the Virginia Company of Plymouth in the fall of 1607. Unlike the Jamestown Settlement, it was not successful, and was abandoned the following spring. The Virginia Company of Plymouth's charter included land extending as far as present-day northern Maine. Captain John Smith, exploring the shores of the region in 1614, named the region "New England" in his account of two voyages there, published as ''A Description of New England''.

The next notable arrival in New England took place in the winter of 1616-1617 at Winter Harbor, afterwards called Biddeford Pool, by Captain Richard Vines. This location is in current-day Biddeford, Maine. Four years later, Plymouth was settled by Pilgrims from the ''Mayflower'', beginning the history of permanent European settlement in New England.

Plymouth Council for New England

The name "New England" was officially sanctioned on November 3, 1620, when the charter of the Virginia Company of Plymouth was replaced by a royal charter for the Plymouth Council for New England, a joint stock company established to colonize and govern the region. As the first colonists arrived in Plymouth, they wrote and signed the Mayflower Compact, their first governing document. The Massachusetts Bay Colony, which would come to dominate the area, was established by royal charter in 1629 with its major town and port of Boston established in 1630.

Massachusetts Puritans began to settle in Connecticut in as early as 1633. Roger Williams, banished for heresy from Massachusetts, led a group south, and founded Providence, Rhode Island in 1636. At this time, Vermont was yet unsettled, and the territories of New Hampshire and Maine were claimed and governed by Massachusetts.

Even during the early stages of English colonization, relations with the indigenous peoples of New England began to sour. Preliminary trade with Europeans had already significantly reduced and weakened native populations via disease and epidemic. The fur supply was soon exhausted, forcing hunters to travel farther into the territories of neighboring tribes, such as the Mohawk and the Haudenosaunee (known to European settlers as the Iroquois) of Eastern New York. As demand for local goods, like beaver pelts, by English companies rose, so did tensions between existing indigenous communities. Permanent English settlement, through which colonists seized or claimed land and began to apply Puritan laws to native peoples, exacerbated the situation.

Relationships between colonists and Native Americans alternated between peace and armed skirmishes. Six years after the bloodiest of these, the Pequot War in 1643, which resulted in the Mystic massacre, the colonies of Massachusetts Bay, Plymouth, New Haven, and Connecticut joined together in a loose compact called the New England Confederation (officially "The United Colonies of New England"). The confederation was designed largely to coordinate mutual defense but was never effective and soon collapsed.

In 1675, King Philip's War resulted in massacres and killings on both sides. The colonists won decisively and, apart from raids sponsored by the French to the north, there were no more major Indian wars.

After the British won the French and Indian War in 1763, the Connecticut River Valley was opened up for settlement into western New Hampshire and what is today Vermont.

The New England colonies were settled largely by farmers who became relatively self-sufficient. During this period, the Puritan work ethic, which defines a part of New England culture even to this day, prevailed. There were blacksmiths, wheelwrights, carpenters, joiners, cordwainers, tanners, ironworkers, spinners, and weavers, when someone needed something - unlike the Southern colonies, who had to buy these items from England.

Dominion of New England

In 1686, King James II, concerned about the increasingly independent ways of the colonies, including their self-governing charters, open flouting of the Navigation Acts, and increasing military power, established the Dominion of New England, an administrative union comprising all of the New England colonies. In 1688, the former Dutch colonies of New York and New Jersey were added. The union, imposed from the outside and contrary to the rooted democratic tradition of the region, was highly unpopular among the colonists.

After the Glorious Revolution in 1689, Bostonians imprisoned the Royal Governor and other sympathizers of King James II on April 18, 1689, thus ending the Dominion Of New England. The charters of the colonies were significantly modified, with the appointment of Royal Governors to nearly every colony. An uneasy tension existed between the Royal Governors, their officers, and the elected governing bodies of the colonies. The governors wanted unlimited authority, and the different layers of locally elected officials would often resist them. In most cases, the local town governments continued operating as self-governing bodies, just as they had before the appointment of the Royal Governors. This tension culminated itself in the American Revolution, boiling over with the breakout of the American War of Independence in 1775. The first battles of the war were fought in Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, eventually leading to the Siege of Boston by continental troops. The Americans surrounded Boston and forced the British to leave quietly.

Region of the United States

After the War of Independence, New England ceased to be a meaningful political unit, but remained a defined historical and cultural region consisting of its now-sovereign constituent states. By 1784, all of the states in the region had introduced the gradual abolition of slavery, with Vermont and Massachusetts introducing total abolition in 1777 and 1783, respectively. During the War of 1812, there was a limited amount of talk of secession from the Union, as New England merchants, just getting back on their feet, opposed the war with their greatest trading partner—Great Britain. Delegates from all over New England met in Hartford in the winter of 1814-15. The gathering was called the Hartford Convention. The twenty-seven delegates met to discuss changes to the US Constitution that would protect the region from similar legislation and attempt to keep political power in the region.

After settling a dispute with New York, Vermont was admitted to statehood in 1791, formally completing the defined area of New England. On March 15, 1820, as part of the Missouri Compromise, the territory of Maine, formerly a part of Massachusetts, was admitted to the Union as a free state. Today, New England is always defined as coextensive with the six states of Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont.

For the remainder of the antebellum period, New England remained distinct. In terms of politics, it often went against the grain of the rest of the country. Massachusetts and Connecticut were among the last refuges of the Federalist Party, and, when the Second Party System began in the 1830s, New England became the strongest bastion of the new Whig Party. The Whigs were usually dominant throughout New England, except in the more Democratic Maine and New Hampshire. Leading statesmen — including Daniel Webster — hailed from the region. New England was distinct in other ways. It was, as a whole, the most industrialized part of the United States; by 1850, it accounted for well over a quarter of all manufacturing value in the United States, and over a third of its industrial workforce. It was at the same time the most literate and most educated region in the country. Notable literary and intellectual figures produced by the United States in the Antebellum period were New Englanders, including Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, John Greenleaf Whittier, George Bancroft, William H. Prescott, and others.

New England was an early center of the industrial revolution. In 1787, the first cotton mill in America, the Beverly Cotton Manufactory, was founded in the North Shore seaport of Beverly, Massachusetts. The Manufactory was also considered the largest cotton mill of its time. Technological developments and achievements from the Manufactory led to the development of more advanced cotton mills, including Slater Mill in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. The Blackstone Valley in Massachusetts and Rhode Island has been called the birthplace of America's industrial revolution. Several textile mills were already underway during the time. Towns such as Lawrence, Massachusetts, Lowell, Massachusetts, Woonsocket, Rhode Island, and Lewiston, Maine became centers of the textile industry following models from Slater Mill and the Beverly Cotton Manufactory. The textile manufacturing in New England was growing rapidly, which caused a shortage of workers. Recruiters were hired by mill agents to bring young women and children from the countryside to work in the factories. Between 1830 and 1860, thousands of farm girls came from their rural homes in New England to work in the mills. Farmers’ daughters left their homes to aid their families financially, save for marriage, and widen their horizons. They also left their homes due to population pressures to look for opportunities in expanding New England cities. Stagecoach and railroad services made it easier for the rapid flow of workers to travel from the country to the city. The majority of female workers came from rural farming towns in northern New England. As the textile industry grew, immigration grew as well. As the number of Irish workers in the mills increased, the number of young women working in the mills decreased. Mill employment of women caused a population boom in urban centers.

New England and areas settled from New England, like Upstate New York, Ohio's Western Reserve and the upper midwestern states of Michigan and Wisconsin, proved to be the center of the strongest abolitionist sentiment in the country. Abolitionists like William Lloyd Garrison and Wendell Phillips were New Englanders, and the region was home to anti-slavery politicians like John Quincy Adams, Charles Sumner, and John P. Hale. When the anti-slavery Republican Party was formed in the 1850s, all of New England, including areas that had previously been strongholds for both the Whig and the Democratic Parties, became strongly Republican, as it would remain until the early 20th century, when immigration would begin to turn the formerly solidly Republican states of Lower New England towards the Democrats.

Geography

The states of New England have a combined area of , making the region slightly larger than the state of Washington and slightly smaller than the island of Great Britain. Maine alone constitutes nearly one-half of the total area of New England, yet is only the 39th largest state, slightly smaller than Indiana. The remaining states are among the smallest in the United States, Including the smallest state, Rhode Island. The other small states, include Connecticut (48th), New Hampshire (46th), Vermont (45th), and Massachusetts (44th).

New England's long rolling hills, mountains, and jagged coastline are glacial landforms resulting from the retreat of ice sheets approximately 18,000 years ago, during the last glacial period. The coast of the region, extending from southwestern Connecticut to northeastern Maine, is dotted with lakes, hills, swamps, and sandy beaches. Further inland are the Appalachian Mountains, extending through Connecticut, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. Among them, in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, is Mount Washington, which at , is the highest peak in the Northeast and is the second-highest peak in the Appalachian Mountain system as well as the second-highest mountain east of the Mississippi River. It is the site of the second highest recorded wind speed on Earth, and has the reputation of having the world's worst weather. Vermont's Green Mountains, which become the Berkshire Hills in western Massachusetts and Connecticut, are smaller than the White Mountains. Valleys in the region include the Connecticut River Valley and the Merrimack Valley.

The longest river is the Connecticut River, which flows from northeastern New Hampshire for 655 km (407 mi), emptying into Long Island Sound, roughly bisecting the region. Lake Champlain, wedged between Vermont and New York, is the largest lake in the region, followed by Moosehead Lake in Maine and Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire.

Climate

Weather patterns vary throughout the region. Most of Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont have a humid continental short summer climate, with mild summers and cold winters. Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, southern coastal Maine, and southern New Hampshire and Vermont have a humid continental long summer climate, with warm summers and cold winters. Owing to thick deciduous forests, fall in New England brings bright and colorful foliage, which comes earlier than in other nearby regions, attracting tourism by "leaf peepers". Springs are generally wet and cloudy. Average rainfall generally ranges from 1,000 to 1,500 mm (40 to 60 in) a year, although the northern parts of Vermont and Maine see slightly less, from 500 to 1,000 mm (20 to 40 in). Snowfall can often exceed annually. As a result, the mountains and ski resorts of Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont are popular destinations in the winter.

The lowest recorded temperature in New England was at Bloomfield, Vermont, on December 30, 1933. This was tied by Big Black River, Maine in 2009. Rhode Island is the warmest state in New England, Maine the coolest; the former is the 27th warmest in the nation, the latter, the 48th warmest (3rd coolest).

The area is geologically part of the New England province.

Demographics

thumb|upright|[[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston is considered to be the cultural and historical capital of New England.]]

According to the 2006-08 American Community Survey, New England had a population of 14,265,187, of which 48.7% were male and 51.3% were female. Approximately 22.4% of the population were under 18 years of age; 13.5% were over 65 years of age.

In terms of race and ethnicity, White Americans made up 84.9% of New England's population, of which 81.2% were whites of non-Hispanic origin. Black Americans comprised 5.7% of the region's population, of which 5.3% were blacks of non-Hispanic origin. Native Americans made up 0.3% of the population; they numbered at 37,234. There were just over 500,000 Asian Americans residing in New England at the time of the survey. Americans of Asian origin form 3.5% of the region's population. Chinese Americans formed 1.1% of the region's total population, and numbered at 158,282. Indian Americans made up 0.8% of the populace, and numbered at 119,140. Japanese Americans numbered 14,501 residents of New England, 0.1% of the population.

Pacific Islander Americans numbered 4,194, 0.03% of the populace. There were 138 Samoan Americans residing in the region. Multiracial Americans made up 1.8% of New England's population. The largest mixed-race group were those of African and European descent; there were 84,143 people of black and white ancestry, equal to 0.6% of the population. People of Native American and European American ancestry made up 0.4% of the population. People of Asian and European heritage made up 0.3% of the population.

Hispanic and Latino Americans are New England's largest minority, and they are the second-largest group in the region behind non-Hispanic European Americans. Hispanics and Latinos of any race made up 7.9% of New England's population, and there were over 1.1 million Hispanic and Latino individuals reported in the survey. Puerto Ricans were the most numerous of the Hispanic and Latino subgroups. Over half a million (507,000) Puerto Ricans live in New England, forming 3.6% of the population. Just over 100,000 Mexican Americans make New England their home. The Dominican population is more than 70,000. Americans of Cuban descent are scant in number; there were roughly 20,000 Cuban Americans in the region. People of other Hispanic and Latino ancestries (e.g. Salvadoran, Colombian, Bolivian, etc.) formed 3.5% of New England's population, and exceeded 492,000 in number.

New England's European American population is ethnically diverse. The majority of the Euro-American population is of Irish, Italian, English, French, and German descent. Smaller, but significant populations of Poles, French Canadians, and Portuguese exist as well.

According to the 2006-2008 survey, the top ten largest European ancestries were the following:

Irish: 21.1% (Over 3 million)

French and French Canadian: 15.3% (1.5 million French and roughly 700,000 French Canadian)

Italian: 14.4% (Over 2 million)

English: 13.7% (1.9 million)

German: 8.2% (1.2 million)

Polish: 5.6% (Roughly 800,000)

Portuguese: 3.5% (Over 500,000)

Scottish: 3.1% (Over 440,000)

Scotch-Irish: 2.1% (Over 290,000)

English is, by far, the most commonly spoken language at home by inhabitants. Approximately 82.7% of all residents (11.1 million people) over the age of five spoke English only at home. The remaining 17.3% of the population spoke non-English languages at home. Roughly 885,000 people (6.6% of the population) spoke Spanish at home. Roughly 1,023,000 people (7.6% of the population) spoke other Indo-European languages at home. In addition, over 313,000 people (2.3% of the population) spoke an Asian or Pacific Island language at home. Slightly fewer(about 2%) spoke French at home, although this figure is above 20% in Northern New England, which borders francophone Québec. Roughly 99,000 people (0.7% of the population) spoke other languages at home.

The vast majority of New England's inhabitants are native to the United States. However, there is a significant foreign-born population in the region. Roughly 12.3 million people (86.3% of the population) were born in the United States. In addition, 2.2% of the population (315,000 people) were born in Puerto Rico, a U.S. territory, or abroad to American parents. Altogether, the native population totals at roughly 12,630,000 people, or 88.5% of the population. The foreign-born population forms over ten percent (11.5%) of New England's total population. There are roughly 1.6 million foreigners residing in the region. Thirty-five percent of foreigners were born in Latin America, 27.9% were born in Europe, 24.5% were born in Asia, and 6.9% were born in Africa. People born in other parts of North America made up 5.3% of the foreign-born populace. Oceania-born residents formed 0.4% of the foreign population, just over 6,000. Of the 1.6 million foreigners, 47.7% were naturalized citizens of the U.S. and the majority (52.3%) were not U.S. citizens.

The six states of New England have the lowest birth rate in the United States.

In 2005, the total population of New England was 14,239,724 people, roughly a 50% increase from its 1929 population of 9,813,000. The region's average population density is 221.66 inhabitants/sq mi (85.59/km²), although a great disparity exists between its northern and southern portions, as noted below. It is much greater than that of the United States as a whole (79.56/sq mi) or even just the contiguous 48 states (94.48/sq mi).

In 2009, two states were among the five highest in the country in divorce rates. Maine was second highest with 13.6% of people over 15 divorced; Vermont was fifth with 12.6% divorced. Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island, on the other hand, have below-average divorce rates. Massachusetts is tied with Georgia with the lowest divorce rate in the U.S., at 2.4%.

Three-quarters of the population of New England and most of the major cities are in the states of Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island. Their combined population density is 786.83/sq mi, compared to northern New England's 63.56/sq mi (2000 census). The most populous state is Massachusetts, and the most populous city is Massachusetts' political and cultural capital, Boston.

The coastline is more urban than western New England, which is typically rural, even in urban states like Massachusetts. This characteristic of the region's population is due mainly to historical factors; the original colonists settled mostly on the coastline of Massachusetts Bay. The only New England state without access to the Atlantic Ocean, Vermont, is also the least urbanized. After nearly 400 years, the region still maintains, for the most part, its historical population layout.

New England's coast is dotted with urban centers, such as Portland, Portsmouth, Boston, New Bedford, Fall River, Providence, New Haven, Bridgeport, and Stamford as well as smaller cities, like Newburyport, Gloucester, Biddeford, Bath, Rockland, Newport, Westerly, Rhode Island, and the small twin cities of Groton and New London, Connecticut.

Southern New England forms an integral part of the BosWash megalopolis, a conglomeration of urban centers that spans from Boston to Washington, D.C.. The region includes three of the four most densely populated states in the United States; only New Jersey has a higher population density than the states of Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and Connecticut.

Greater Boston, which includes parts of southern New Hampshire, has a total population of approximately 4.4 million, while over half the population of New England falls inside Boston's Combined Statistical Area of over 7.4 million.

Largest cities

The most populous cities are as of 2010 Census: # Boston, Massachusetts: 617,594 # Worcester, Massachusetts: 181,045 # Providence, Rhode Island: 178,042 # Springfield, Massachusetts: 153,060 # Bridgeport, Connecticut: 144,229 # New Haven, Connecticut: 129,779 # Hartford, Connecticut: 124,775 # Stamford, Connecticut: 122,643 # Waterbury, Connecticut: 110,366 # Manchester, New Hampshire: 109,565 # Lowell, Massachusetts: 106,519 # Cambridge, Massachusetts: 105,162

During the 20th century, urban expansion in regions surrounding New York City has become an important economic influence on neighboring Connecticut, parts of which belong to the New York Metropolitan Area. The US Census Bureau groups Fairfield, New Haven and Litchfield counties in western Connecticut together with New York City, and other parts of New York and New Jersey as a combined statistical area.

Health

The six states ranked within the top thirteen "healthiest states" in 2007. In 2008, they all placed within the top eleven states. New England had the largest proportion of its population covered by health insurance.

For 2006, four states in the region, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Connecticut, joined 12 others nationwide, where death from drugs had overtaken traffic fatalities. This was due in part to declining traffic fatalities and partly due to increased deaths from prescription drugs.

In comparing national obesity rates by state, four of the six lowest obesity states were Connecticut, Massachusetts, Vermont and Rhode Island. New Hampshire and Maine had the 15th and 18th lowest obesity rates, making New England the least overweight part of the United States.

In 2008, three of New England's states had the least number of uninsured motorists (out of the top five states) - Massachusetts - 1%, Maine - 4%, and Vermont - 6%.

In 2006, Massachusetts adopted health care reform that requires nearly all state residents obtain health insurance, which served as an important model for the federal 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

Nursing home care can be expensive in the region. A private room in Connecticut averaged $125,925 annually. A one-bedroom in an assisted living facility averaged $55,137 in Massachusetts. Both are national highs.

Economy

Overview

Several factors contribute to the uniqueness of the New England economy. The region is geographically isolated from the rest of the United States, and is relatively small. It is an important supplier of unique natural resources and products, such as granite, lobster, and codfish.

Its population is concentrated on the coast and in its southern states, and its residents have a strong regional identity. America's textile industry began along the Blackstone River with the Slater Mill at Pawtucket, Rhode Island. This was soon duplicated at similar sources of water power such as Woonsocket, Rhode Island, Uxbridge, Massachusetts, and the manufacturing centers of Lowell, Lawrence, Massachusetts, Fall River, Massachusetts, and Manchester, NH

In the early 20th century, the region underwent a long period of deindustrialization as traditional manufacturing companies relocated to the Midwest. In the mid-to-late 20th century, manufacturing was replaced by education, health services, finance, and high technology (including computer and electronic equipment manufacturing) as the region's most important economic motors.

As of 2007, the inflation-adjusted combined GSPs of the six states of New England was $763.7 billion, with Massachusetts ($365 billion) contributing the most, and Vermont ($25.4 billion) the least.

Exports

Exports consist mostly of industrial products, including specialized machines and weaponry (aircraft and missiles especially), built by the region's educated workforce. About half of the region's exports consist of industrial and commercial machinery, such as computers and electronic and electrical equipment. This, when combined with instruments, chemicals, and transportation equipment, makes up about three-quarters of the region's exports. Granite is quarried at Barre, Vermont, guns made at Springfield, Massachusetts and Saco, Maine, boats at Groton, Connecticut and Bath, Maine, and hand tools at Turners Falls, Massachusetts. Insurance is a driving force in and around Hartford, Connecticut.

New England exports food products, ranging from fish to lobster, cranberries, Maine potatoes, and maple syrup. The service industry is important, including tourism, education, financial and insurance services, plus architectural, building, and construction services. The U.S. Department of Commerce has called the New England economy a microcosm for the entire United States economy.

Manufacturing

In 2010, a University of Connecticut study indicated that five of the six states rank 43rd or lower for manufacturing costs, meaning that manufacturing in New England is generally costlier than in other parts of the United States. Only Maine was less costly. Vermont, Rhode Island and New Hampshire tied for last place. Historic manufacturing cities like Lowell, Massachusetts have attempted to reuse mill buildings for residential and commercial purposes.

Agriculture

Agriculture is limited by the area's rocky soil and cooler climate. Some New England states, however, are ranked highly among U.S. states for particular areas of production. Maine is ranked ninth for aquaculture, and has abundant potato fields in its northeast part. Vermont fifteenth for dairy products, and Connecticut and Massachusetts seventh and eleventh for tobacco, respectively. Cranberries are grown in Massachusetts' Cape Cod-Plymouth-South Shore area, and blueberries in Maine.

Energy

The region is mostly energy efficient compared to the country at large, with every state but Maine ranking within the ten most energy-efficient states in the U.S.; every state in New England also ranks within the ten most expensive states in terms of electricity prices.

Three of the six New England states are among the country's highest consumers of nuclear power: Vermont (first, 73.7%), Connecticut (fourth, 48.9%), and New Hampshire (sixth, 46%).

Employment

As of June 2010, the unemployment rate in New England was 8.6%, below the national average. New Hampshire, with the lowest of the six states, had a rate of 5.9%. The highest was Rhode Island, with 12.0%. As of May 2010, the metropolitan statistical area (MSA) with the lowest rate, 4.8%, was Burlington-South Burlington, Vermont; the MSA with the highest rate, 14.6%, was Lawrence-Methuen-Salem, in Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire.

According to the 2000 census, New England has two of the ten poorest cities (by percentage living below the poverty line) in the United States: the state capital cities of Providence, Rhode Island and Hartford, Connecticut. These cities have struggled as manufacturing, their traditional economic mainstay, has declined. On the other hand, New Hampshire, as of 2008, had the lowest poverty rate in the United States.

Taxes

In 2001, four of the six states, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Vermont, and New Hampshire, were rated as having among the top ten highest annual median real estate taxes in the country, as a percentage of median homeowners income.

In 2009, four of the six states, Connecticut, Maine, Rhode Island, and Vermont, were within the top ten U.S. states in terms of overall tax burden. Massachusetts was not in the top ten; New Hampshire was amongst the five states with the least overall tax burden. In terms of per capita income, however, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire are also three of the wealthiest states, with Connecticut being ranked first in the U.S.

Politics

The early European settlers of New England were English Protestants fleeing religious persecution. This, however, did not prevent them from establishing colonies where religion was legislated to an extreme, and where those who deviated from the established doctrine were persecuted greatly. The early history of much of New England is marked by religious intolerance and harsh laws. In the beginning, there was no separation of church and state in these places, and the activities of the individual were severely restricted. This contrasts sharply with the strong separation of church and state upon which Rhode Island was founded. Providence had no public burial ground and no Common until the year 1700 (64 years after its founding) because religious and government institutions were so rigorously kept distinct.

Contemporary politics

New England today is politically a relatively liberal region. Since 1962, the dominant party in New England has been the Democratic Party. As of the 2010 elections, the state legislatures in Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Vermont have Democratic majorities, while the state legislatures in Maine and New Hampshire have Republican majorities. The state legislatures of Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Vermont all have Democratic supermajorities, while New Hampshire's state legislature has a Republican supermajority. Democrats hold the governorships in four states: Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont. Republicans hold the governor's office in Maine. Rhode Island is the only state in the nation with an Independent governor.

Due to the liberal lean of the region, the state Republican parties and the elected Republican officials have been more politically and socially moderate than the national Republican Party, including Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine and Scott Brown of Massachusetts. Republican Senator Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, however, is fairly conservative, but this is reflective of New Hampshire being the most conservative state in the region. Governor Paul LePage of Maine is also considered to be conservative and was backed by Tea Party in the 2010 Maine gubernatorial election, winning 38% of the vote in a race with several independent candidates.

As of the 2010 census, collectively, New England will have 33 electoral votes, though they are decided by each state. In the 2000 presidential election, Democratic candidate Al Gore carried all of the New England states except for New Hampshire, and in 2004, John Kerry, a New Englander himself, won all six New England states. In both the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections, every congressional district with the exception of New Hampshire's 1st district were won by Gore and Kerry respectively. During the 2008 Democratic primaries, Hillary Clinton won the three New England states containing Greater Boston (Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire), while Barack Obama won the three that did not (Connecticut, Maine, and Vermont). In the 2008 presidential election, the Democratic candidate, Barack Obama, carried all six states by 9 percentage points or more. He carried every county in New England except for Piscataquis County, Maine, which he lost by 4% to Senator John McCain (R-AZ).

The six states of New England voted for the Democratic Presidential nominee in the 1992, 1996, 2004, and 2008 elections, and every state but New Hampshire voted for Al Gore in the presidential election of 2000. It is one of the most liberal regions in the United States. Currently, the House delegations from Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Vermont are all-Democratic, while New Hampshire's is all-Republican. New England is home to the only two independents currently serving in the U.S. Senate-Bernie Sanders representing Vermont and Joseph Lieberman representing Connecticut.

New Hampshire primary

Historically, the New Hampshire primary has been the first in a series of nationwide political party primary elections held in the United States every four years. Held in the state of New Hampshire, it usually marks the beginning of the U.S. presidential election process. Even though few delegates are chosen from New Hampshire, the primary has always been pivotal to both New England and American politics. One college in particular, Saint Anselm College has been home to numerous national presidential debates and visits by candidates to its campus while campaigning to students. Local factories and diners are valuable photo-ops for candidates, who hope to use this quintessential New England image to their advantage by portraying themselves as sympathetic to blue collar workers. Media coverage of the primary enables candidates low on funds to "rally back"; an example of this was President Bill Clinton who referred to himself as "The Comeback Kid" following the 1992 primary. National media outlets have converged on small New Hampshire towns, such as during the 2007 and 2008 national presidential debates held at Saint Anselm College in the town of Goffstown. Goffstown and other towns in New Hampshire have been experiencing this influx of national media since the 1950s.

Political party strength

{|class="wikitable sortable" |- ! State !! Governor !! Senior U.S. Senator !! Junior U.S. Senator !! U.S. House Delegation !! Upper House Majority !! Lower House Majority |- | CT || |D. Malloy || |J. Lieberman || |R. Blumenthal || |Democratic 5-0 || |Democratic 22-14 || |Democratic 99-52 |- | ME || |P. LePage || |O. Snowe || |S. Collins || |Democratic 2-0 || |Republican 20-14-1 || |Republican 78-72-1 |- | MA || |D. Patrick || |J. Kerry || |S. Brown || |Democratic 10-0 || |Democratic 36-4 || |Democratic 128-31-1 |- | NH || |J. Lynch || |J. Shaheen || |K. Ayotte || |Republican 2-0 || |Republican 19-5 || |Republican 294-103-3 |- | RI || |L. Chafee || |J. Reed || |S. Whitehouse || |Democratic 2-0 || |Democratic 29-8-1 || |Democratic 65-10 |- | VT || |P. Shumlin || |P. Leahy || |B. Sanders || |Democratic 1-0 || |Democratic 20-8-2 || |Democratic 96-46-8 |}

Anti-nuclear movement

The national movement against nuclear power had its roots in New England in the 1970s. Its beginnings can be traced to 1974 when activist Sam Lovejoy toppled a weather tower at the site of the proposed Montague Nuclear Power Plant in Western Massachusetts. The movement “reached critical mass’’ with the arrests at Seabrook Station Nuclear Power Plant on May 1, 1977, when 1,414 anti-nuclear activists from the Clamshell Alliance were arrested at the Seabrook site. Harvey Wasserman, a Clamshell spokesman at Seabrook, and Frances Crowe of Northampton, an American Friends Service Committee member, played key roles in the movement.

Government

In a study from 2005 to 2008, three New England states, Rhode Island, Connecticut and New Hampshire were among the five states with the highest average property taxes, in percent of home value, in the country. On the other hand, New Hampshire has neither a sales nor income tax. Massachusetts and New Hampshire have below-average per capita tax burdens; Connecticut, Maine, Rhode Island, and Vermont have above-average per capita tax burdens.

Town meetings

A derivative of meetings held by church elders, town meetings were and are an integral part of governance of many New England towns. At such meetings, any citizen of the town may discuss issues with other members of the community and vote on them. This is the strongest example of direct democracy in the United States today, and the form of dialogue has been adopted under certain circumstances elsewhere, most strongly in the states closest to the region, such as New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Such a strong democratic tradition was even apparent in the early 19th century, when Alexis de Tocqueville wrote in ''Democracy in America'' that in:

James Madison, a critic of town meetings, however, wrote in ''Federalist No. 55'' that, regardless of the assembly, "passion never fails to wrest the scepter from reason. Had every Athenian citizen been a Socrates, every Athenian assembly would still have been a mob." Today, the use and effectiveness of town meetings, as well as the possible application of the format to other regions and countries, is still discussed by scholars.

Notable laws

The New England states abolished the death penalty for robbery and burglary in the 19th century, before much of the rest of the United States did. New Hampshire and Connecticut are the only New England states that allow capital punishment. Although New Hampshire currently has one death row inmate, it has not held an execution since 1939. Connecticut held an execution in 2005, the first in New England since a previous Connecticut execution in 1960.

Connecticut and Rhode Island were the only states in the union to not ratify the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, also known as prohibition. This was only a symbolic act, as Congress ratified it on January 16, 1919.

Same-sex marriage is permitted in four New England states. In 2010, it was being debated in the Rhode Island legislature. In Maine, it was legalized by the legislature in 2009, but defeated in a referendum (53% voted to ban it versus 47% who voted to legalize it) later the same year.

New Hampshire has no seatbelt law for persons over 18 years of age, no helmet law for motorcyclists , no mandatory auto-insurance law, and has neither an income tax nor a sales tax

Vermont, Maine and New Hampshire allow the open-carry of firearms in public places without requiring persons carrying firearms to have a permit, Vermont also allows concealed-carry of firearms without a permit.

Education

Colleges and universities

New England contains some of the oldest and most renowned institutions of higher learning in the United States. The first such institution, subsequently named Harvard College, was founded at Cambridge, Massachusetts, to train preachers, in 1636. Yale University was founded in Old Saybrook, Connecticut, in 1701, and awarded the nation's first doctoral (Ph.D.) degree in 1861. Yale moved to New Haven, Connecticut, in 1718 where it has remained to the present day. Brown University, the first college in the nation to accept students of all religious affiliations and seventh-oldest institution of higher learning, was founded in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1764. Dartmouth College was founded five years later in Hanover, New Hampshire, with the mission of educating the local American Indian population as well as English youth. The University of Vermont, the fifth oldest university in New England, was founded in 1791, the same year Vermont joined the Union.

In addition to four out of eight Ivy League schools, New England also contains the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the Little Three, four of the original seven sisters, the bulk of institutions identified as the Little Ivies, and the Five Colleges consortium in western Massachusetts.

Private and independent secondary schools

At the pre-college level, New England is home to a number of American independent schools (also known as private schools). The concept of the elite "New England prep school" (preparatory school) and the "preppy" lifestyle is an iconic part of the region's image. The region has several of the highest ranked high schools in the United States, such as the Maine School of Science and Mathematics located in Limestone, Maine.

:See the list of private schools for each state: Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont.

Public education

New England is home to some of the oldest public schools in the nation. Boston Latin School is the oldest public school in America. Several signatories of the Declaration of Independence attended Boston Latin. Portland High School in Portland, Maine is the second oldest operating high school in the United States.

As of 2005, the National Education Association ranked Connecticut with the highest-paid teachers in the country. Massachusetts and Rhode Island ranked eighth and ninth, respectively.

Three New England states, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont, have cooperated in developing a New England Common Assessment Program test under the No Child Left Behind guidelines. These states can compare the resultant scores with each other.

Maine's Maine Learning Technology Initiative program supplies all 7-8th graders and half of the states high schoolers with Apple MacBook laptops.

Academic journals and press

Several academic journals and publishing companies are published in the region, including ''The New England Journal of Medicine'', Harvard University Press, and Yale University Press. Some of its institutions lead the open access alternative to conventional academic publication, including MIT, the University of Connecticut, and the University of Maine. The Federal Reserve Bank of Boston publishes the ''New England Economic Review''.

Culture

New England has a history of shared heritage and culture primarily shaped by waves of immigration from Europe. In contrast to other American regions, many of New England's earliest Puritan settlers came from eastern England, contributing to New England's distinctive accents, foods, customs, and social structures. Within modern New England a cultural divide exists between urban New Englanders living along the densely-populated coastline and rural New Englanders in western Massachusetts, northwestern Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine, where population density is low.

Today, New England is the least religious part of the United States. In 2009, less than half of those polled in Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont claimed that religion was an important part of their daily lives. In Connecticut and Rhode Island, also among the ten least religious states, at 55 and 53 percent, respectively, of those polled claimed that it was. According to the American Religious Identification Survey, 34 percent of Vermonters, a plurality, claimed to have no religion; on average, nearly one out of every four New Englanders identifies as having no religion, more than any other part of the United States. New England had one of the highest percentages of Catholics in the United States. This number declined from 50% in 1990 to 36% in 2008.

Cultural roots

The first European colonists of New England were focused on maritime affairs such as whaling and fishing, rather than more continental inclinations such as surplus farming. One of the older American regions, New England has developed a distinct cuisine, dialect, architecture, and government. New England cuisine is known for its emphasis on seafood and dairy; clam chowder, lobster, and other products of the sea are among some of the region's most popular foods.

Aside from the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, or "New Scotland", New England is the only North American region to inherit the name of a kingdom in the British Isles. New England has largely preserved its regional character, especially in its historic places. Today, the region is more ethnically diverse, having seen waves of immigration from Ireland, Quebec, Italy, Portugal, Asia, Latin America, Africa, other parts of the United States, and elsewhere. The enduring European influence can be seen in the region, from use of traffic rotaries to the bilingual French and English towns of northern Vermont, Maine, and New Hampshire, as innocuous as the sprinkled use of British spelling, and as obvious as the region's heavy prevalence of English town and county names, and its unique, often non-rhotic coastal dialect reminiscent of southeastern England.

Within New England, there are many town (and a few county) names that repeat from state to state, primarily due to settlers throughout the region naming their new towns after their old ones. As one example, every state except Rhode Island has a city or town named Franklin; in addition, Massachusetts, Vermont, and Maine each contain a Franklin County.

Accents

There are several American English accents spoken in the region including New England English and Boston Accent.

The often-parodied Boston accent is native to the region. Many of its most stereotypical features (such as r-dropping and the so-called broad A) are believed to have originated in Boston from the influence of England's Received Pronunciation, which shares those features. While at one point Boston accents were most strongly associated with the so-called "Eastern Establishment" and Boston's upper class, today the accent is predominantly associated with blue-collar natives as exemplified by movies like ''Good Will Hunting'' and ''The Departed''. The Boston accent and accents closely related to it cover eastern Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Maine.

Some Rhode Islanders speak with a non-rhotic accent that many compare to a "Brooklyn" or a cross between a New York and Boston accent ("water" becomes "wata"). Many Rhode Islanders distinguish the ''aw'' sound , as one might hear in New Jersey; e.g., the word ''coffee'' is pronounced . This type of accent was brought to the region by early settlers from eastern England in the Puritan migration to New England in the mid-seventeenth century.

Social activities and music

In much of rural New England, particularly Maine, Acadian and Québécois culture are included in the region's music and dance. Contra dancing and country square dancing are popular throughout New England, usually backed by live Irish, Acadian, or other folk music.

Traditional knitting, quilting and rug hooking circles in rural New England have become less common; church, sports, and town government are more typical social activities. These traditional gatherings are often hosted in individual homes or civic centers; larger groups regularly assemble at special-purpose ice cream parlors that dot the countryside. In fact, New England leads the country in ice cream consumption per capita.

In the United States, candlepin bowling is essentially confined to New England, where it was invented in the 19th century.

New England was for some time an important center of American classical music. The Second New England School was instrumental in reinvigorating the tradition in the United States. Prominent modernist composers also come from the region, including Charles Ives and John Adams. Boston is the site of the New England Conservatory and the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

In terms of rock music, the region has produced bands as different as Aerosmith, the Pixies, and Boston. Dick Dale, a Quincy, Massachusetts native, helped popularize surf rock. The region is also home to prominent hardcore and punk scenes.

Media

The leading national cable TV sports broadcaster ESPN is headquartered in Bristol, Connecticut. New England has several regional cable networks, including New England Cable News (NECN) and the New England Sports Network (NESN). New England Cable News is the largest regional 24-hour cable news network in the United States, broadcasting to more than 3.2 million homes in all of the New England states. Its studios are located in Newton, Massachusetts, outside of Boston, it maintains bureaus in Manchester, New Hampshire; Hartford, Connecticut; Worcester, Massachusetts; Portland, Maine; and Burlington, Vermont. In Connecticut, Litchfield, Fairfield, and New Haven counties also broadcast New York based news programs—this is due in part to the immense influence New York has on this region's economy and culture, and also to enable Connecticut broadcasters the ability to compete with overlapping media coverage from New York-area broadcasters.

NESN broadcasts the Boston Red Sox and Boston Bruins baseball throughout the region, save for Fairfield County, Connecticut. Most of Connecticut (save for Tolland and Windham counties in the state's northeast corner) and even southern Rhode Island gets YES network, the channel which the New York Yankees are broadcast on. For the most part, the same areas also carry SNY, Sports New York, which is the channel New York Mets games are broadcasted on.

Comcast SportsNet New England carries the Boston Celtics, New England Revolution and Boston Cannons.

While most New England cities have daily newspapers, the ''Boston Globe'' and ''New York Times'' are distributed widely throughout the region. Major newspapers also include ''The Providence Journal'', and ''Hartford Courant'', the nation's oldest continuously published newspaper.

Comedy

New Englanders are well represented in American comedy. Writers for ''The Simpsons'' often come by way of the Harvard Lampoon. ''Family Guy,'' an animated sitcom situated in Rhode Island, as well as ''American Dad,'' were created by Connecticut native and Rhode Island School of Design graduate Seth MacFarlane. A number of ''Saturday Night Live'' (SNL) cast members have origins in New England, from Adam Sandler to Amy Poehler, who also stars in the NBC television series ''Parks and Recreation''. Former ''Daily Show'' show correspondents Rob Corddry and Steve Carell are from Massachusetts, with the latter also being involved in film and the American adaptation of ''The Office''. Late night television hosts Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien have origins in the Boston area. Notable stand-up comedians, including Dane Cook, Steve Sweeney, Steven Wright, Sarah Silverman, Lisa Lampanelli, and Louis CK, are also from the region. ''SNL'' cast member Seth Meyers once attributed the region's imprint on American humor to its "sort of wry New England sense of pointing out anyone who's trying to make a big deal of himself", with the ''Boston Globe'' suggesting that irony and sarcasm, as well as Irish influences, are its trademarks.

Literature

The literature of New England has had an enduring influence on American literature in general, with themes such as religion, race, the individual versus society, social repression, and nature, emblematic of the larger concerns of American letters.

New England has been the birthplace of American authors and poets. Ralph Waldo Emerson was born in Boston. Henry David Thoreau was born in Concord, Massachusetts, where he famously lived, for some time, by Walden Pond, on Emerson's land. Nathaniel Hawthorne, romantic era writer, was born in historical Salem; later, he would live in Concord at the same time as Emerson and Thoreau; all three writers have strong connections to The Old Manse, a home in the Emerson family and a key center of the Transcendentalist movement. Emily Dickinson lived most of her life in Amherst, Massachusetts. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was from Portland, Maine. Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston. According to reports, the famed Mother Goose, the author of fairy tales and nursery rhymes was originally a person named Elizabeth Foster Goose or Mary Goose who lived in Boston. Poets James Russell Lowell, Amy Lowell, and Robert Lowell, a Confessionalist poet and teacher of Sylvia Plath, were all New England natives. Anne Sexton, also taught by Lowell, was born and died in Massachusetts. Much of the work of Nobel Prize laureate Eugene O'Neill is often associated with the city of New London, Connecticut where he spent many summers. The 14th U.S. Poet Laureate Donald Hall, a New Hampshire resident, continues the line of renowned New England poets. Noah Webster, the Father of American Scholarship and Education, was born in West Hartford, Connecticut. Pulitzer Prize winning poets Edwin Arlington Robinson, Edna St. Vincent Millay and Robert P. T. Coffin were born in Maine. Poets Stanley Kunitz and Elizabeth Bishop were both born in Worcester, Massachusetts. Pulitzer Prize winning poet Galway Kinnell was born in Providence, Rhode Island. Oliver La Farge was a New Englander of French and Narragansett descent, won the Pulitzer Prize for the Novel, the predecessor to the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, in 1930 for his book Laughing Boy. John P. Marquand grew up in Newburyport, Massachusetts. Novelist Edwin O'Connor, who was also known as a radio personality and journalist, won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for his novel The Edge of Sadness. Pulitzer Prize winner John Cheever, a novelist and short story writer, was born in Quincy, Massachusetts set most of his fiction in old New England villages based on various South Shore towns around his birthcity. E. Annie Proulx was born in Norwich, Connecticut. David Lindsay-Abaire, who won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2007 for his play Rabbit Hole, was raised in Boston.

''Ethan Frome'', written in 1911 by Edith Wharton, is set in turn-of-the-century New England, in the fictitious town of Starkfield, Massachusetts. Like much literature of the region, it plays off themes of isolation and hopelessness. New England is also the setting for most of the gothic horror stories of H. P. Lovecraft, who lived his life in Providence, Rhode Island. Real New England towns such as Ipswich, Newburyport, Rowley, and Marblehead are given fictional names such as Dunwich, Arkham, Innsmouth, Kingsport, and Miskatonic and then featured quite often in his stories. Lovecraft had an immense appreciation for the New England area, and when he had to re-locate to New York City, he longed to return to his beloved native land.

The region has also drawn the attention of authors and poets from other parts of the United States. Mark Twain found Hartford to be the most beautiful city in the United States and made it his home, and wrote his masterpieces there. He lived directly next door to Harriett Beecher Stowe, a local whose most famous work is Uncle Tom's Cabin. John Updike, originally from Pennsylvania, eventually moved to Ipswich, Massachusetts, which served as the model for the fictional New England town of Tarbox in his 1968 novel ''Couples''. Robert Frost was born in California, but moved to Massachusetts during his teen years and published his first poem in Lawrence; his frequent use of New England settings and themes ensured that he would be associated with the region. Arthur Miller, a New York City native, used New England as the setting for some of his works, most notably ''The Crucible''. Herman Melville, originally from New York City, bought the house now known as Arrowhead in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, and while he lived there he wrote his greatest novel ''Moby-Dick''. Poet Maxine Kumin was born in Philadelphia, currently resides in Warner, New Hampshire. Pulitzer Prize winning poet Mary Oliver was born in Maple Heights, Ohio has lived in Provincetown, Massachusetts for the last forty years. Charles Simic who was born in Belgrade, Serbia (at that time Yugoslavia) grew up in Chicago and lives in Strafford, New Hampshire, on the shore of Bow Lake and is the professor emeritus of American literature and creative writing at the University of New Hampshire. Pulitzer Prize winning novelist and short story writer Steven Millhauser, whose short story "Eisenheim the Illusionist" was adapted into the 2006 film ''The Illusionist'', was born in New York City and raised in Connecticut.

More recently, Stephen King, born in Portland, Maine, has used the small towns of his home state as the setting for much of his horror fiction, with several of his stories taking place in or near the fictional town of Castle Rock. Just to the south, Exeter, New Hampshire was the birthplace of best-selling novelist John Irving and Dan Brown, author of ''The Da Vinci Code''. Rick Moody has set many of his works in southern New England, focusing on wealthy families of suburban Connecticut's Gold Coast and their battles with addiction and anomie. Derek Walcott, a playwright and poet, who won the 1992 Nobel Prize for Literature, teaches poetry at Boston University. Pulitzer Prize winner Cormac McCarthy, whose novel No Country for Old Men was made into the Academy Award for Best Picture winning film in 2007, was born in Providence (although he moved to Tennessee when he was a boy). New York Times Bestselling author Dennis Lehane, another native of the Boston area, who was born in Dorchester, wrote the novels that were adapted into the films ''Mystic River'', ''Gone Baby Gone'' and ''Shutter Island''.

Largely on the strength of its local writers, Boston was for some years the center of the U.S. publishing industry, before being overtaken by New York in the middle of the nineteenth century. Boston remains the home of publishers Houghton Mifflin and Pearson Education, and was the longtime home of literary magazine ''The Atlantic Monthly''. Merriam-Webster is based in Springfield, Massachusetts. ''Yankee'', a magazine for New Englanders, is based in Dublin, New Hampshire.

Sports

Two popular American sports were invented in New England. Basketball was invented by James Naismith (a Canadian) in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1891. Volleyball was invented by William G. Morgan in Holyoke, Massachusetts, in 1895. Additionally, Walter Camp is credited with developing modern American football in New Haven, Connecticut in the 1870s and 1880s.

New Hampshire Motor Speedway is an oval racetrack which has hosted several NASCAR and American Championship Car Racing races, whereas Lime Rock Park is a traditional road racing venue home of sports car races. Events at these venues have had the "New England" moniker, such as the NASCAR New England 300 and New England 200, the IndyCar Series New England Indy 200 and the American Le Mans Series New England Grand Prix.

Professional and semi-professional sports teams

The major professional sports teams in New England are based in the Boston area: the Boston Red Sox, the New England Patriots (based in Foxborough, Massachusetts), the Boston Celtics, the Boston Bruins, the Boston Cannons and the New England Revolution (also based in Foxborough). Hartford had a professional hockey team, the Hartford Whalers from 1975 until they moved to North Carolina in 1997. Bridgeport had a professional lacrosse team the Bridgeport Barrage until they moved to Philadelphia and later ceased operation. A WNBA team, the Connecticut Sun, are based in southeastern Connecticut at the Mohegan Sun resort. Hartford currently has a professional football franchise, the Hartford Colonials, of the fledgling United Football League.

There are also minor league baseball and hockey teams based in larger cities such as the Pawtucket Red Sox (baseball), the Providence Bruins (hockey), the Worcester Tornadoes (baseball),the Brockton Rox (baseball) and the Worcester Sharks (hockey), the Lowell Spinners (baseball) and the Lowell Devils (hockey), the Portland Sea Dogs (baseball) and the Portland Pirates (hockey), the Bridgeport Bluefish (baseball) and the Bridgeport Sound Tigers (hockey), the Connecticut Defenders (baseball), the New Britain Rock Cats (baseball), the Vermont Lake Monsters (baseball), the New Hampshire Fisher Cats (baseball) and the Manchester Monarchs (hockey), the Brockton Rox (baseball), the Hartford Wolf Pack (hockey), and the Springfield Falcons (hockey).

The NBA Development League fields two teams in New England: the Maine Red Claws, based in Portland, Maine, and the Springfield Armor in Springfield, Massachusetts. The Red Claws are affiliated with the Boston Celtics and the Charlotte Bobcats and the Armor are affiliated with the New Jersey Nets, New York Knicks, and Philadelphia 76ers. New England is also represented in the Premier Basketball League by the Vermont Frost Heaves of Barre, Vermont and, until recently, the Manchester Millrats from Manchester, New Hampshire.

Thanksgiving Day high school football rivalries date back to the 19th century, and the Harvard-Yale rivalry ("The Game") is the oldest active rivalry in college football. The Boston Marathon, run on Patriots' Day every year, is a New England cultural institution and the oldest annual marathon in the world. While the race offers far less prize money than many other marathons, and the Newton hills have helped ensure that no world record has been set on the course since 1947, the race's difficulty and long history make it one of the world's most prestigious marathons.

Notable places

Historic

New England features many of the oldest cities and towns in the country. The following places are replete with historic buildings, parks, and streetscapes:

Walpole, New Hampshire

New Haven, Connecticut

Hartford, Connecticut

Springfield, Massachusetts

Providence, Rhode Island

Newport, Rhode Island

Plymouth, Massachusetts

Boston and its surrounding area

Quincy, Massachusetts

Salem, Massachusetts

Gloucester, Massachusetts

Newburyport, Massachusetts

Portsmouth, New Hampshire

Portland, Maine

Cape Elizabeth, Maine

Bangor, Maine

Eastport, Maine

Recreational

The Appalachian Mountains run through northern New England, which provides for recreational hiking and 16 ski areas that have least of vertical drop throughout Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine.

Cape Cod, Nantucket, and Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts are popular tourist destinations for their small-town charm and beaches. All have restrictive zoning laws to prevent sprawl and overdevelopment.

Acadia National Park, off the coast of Maine, preserves most of Mount Desert Island and includes mountains, an ocean shoreline, woodlands, and lakes.

Additionally, the coastal New England states are home to many oceanfront beaches.

The financial magazine ''Money'', in a 2006 survey entitled "Best Places to Live", ranked several New England towns and cities in the top one hundred. In Connecticut, Fairfield, part of the New York, New Jersey, Connecticut area, was ranked ninth, while Stamford was ranked forty-sixth. In Maine, Portland ranked eighty-ninth. In Massachusetts, Newton was ranked twenty-second. In New Hampshire, Nashua, a past number one, was ranked eighty-seventh. In Rhode Island, Cranston was ranked seventy-eighth, while Warwick was ranked eighty-third.

Transportation

Six mainline Interstate highways cross New England, with at least one serving each state and its respective capital city:

20px Interstate 84 enters New England at Danbury, Connecticut, and crosses that state to the northeast; connecting the city of Waterbury and the state capital of Hartford before terminating at a junction with Interstate 90 in Massachusetts.

20px Interstate 90, also signed east-west, carries the Massachusetts Turnpike designation as it crosses the state. I-90 enters Massachusetts at West Stockbridge and travels eastward to its terminus in Boston; connecting the cities of Springfield and Worcester and intersecting many of New England's major north-south routes.

20px Interstate 89, signed north-south, begins at a junction with Interstate 93 just south of Concord, New Hampshire. I-89 travels to the northwest towards its terminus at the Canadian border, connecting Lebanon, the state capital of Montpelier, and Burlington (Vermont's largest city) along the way.

20px Interstate 91 begins in New Haven, Connecticut at a junction with Interstate 95, running north from there throughout Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Vermont until it reaches the Canadian border. I-91 parallels U.S. Route 5 for its entire length, and much of the route also follows the Connecticut River, linking many of the major cities and towns along the river including Hartford, Springfield, and Brattleboro. I-91 is the only Interstate route within New England that intersects five of the others.

20px Interstate 93 begins in Canton, Massachusetts at a junction with Interstate 95, running northeastward from there through the city of Boston. I-93 travels north from Boston and into New Hampshire, where it serves as the main Interstate highway through that state and links many of the larger cities and towns (including the capital, Concord, and the largest city north of Boston--including other Massachusetts cities--Manchester). I-93 eventually enters Vermont and reaches its northern terminus at a junction with Interstate 91 at St. Johnsbury.

20px Interstate 95, which runs along the East Coast, enters New England at Greenwich, Connecticut, and runs in a general northeastern direction along the Atlantic Ocean, eventually heading through Maine's sparsely-populated north country to its northern terminus at the Canadian border. I-95 serves many of the coastline's cities, including the state capitals of Providence and Augusta, while serving as a partial beltway around Boston. I-95 travels through every New England state except Vermont, and is the only two-digit Interstate highway to enter the states of Rhode Island and Maine.

The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) provides rail and subway service within the Boston metropolitan area, bus service in Greater Boston, and commuter rail service throughout Eastern Massachusetts and parts of Rhode Island. The New York City Metropolitan Transportation Authority's Metro-North Commuter Railroad provides rail, serving many commuters in Southwestern Connecticut, while the Connecticut Department of Transportation operates the Shore Line East commuter rail service along the Connecticut coastline east of New Haven.

Amtrak provides interstate rail service throughout New England. Boston is the northern terminus of the Northeast Corridor line. The Vermonter connects Vermont to Massachusetts and Connecticut, while the Downeaster links Maine to Boston.

Almost all of New England scored "Best" on the 2011 American State Litter Scorecard, excepting Massachusetts. The 50 states were ranked for overall effectiveness and quality of their public space cleanliness—-primarily roadway and adjacent litter--from state and related debris removal efforts.

See also

Extreme points of New England

Historic New England

List of amusement parks in New England

List of beaches in New England

New England Fieldstone

Mammals of New England

New Albion

New Albion (colony)

New England-Acadian forests

New England Summer Nationals

New England Planters

Northeastern coastal forests

Southeastern New England wine region

Swamp Yankee

Notes

References

New York: Atlas of Historical County Boundaries; John H. Long, Editor; Compiled by Kathryn Ford Thorne; A Project of the Dr. William M. Scholl Center for Family and Community History; The new Berry Library; Simon & Schuster; 1993.

U.S. Census Bureau. . Retrieved May 11, 2005

Further reading

Hall, Donald, Burt Feintuch, and David H. Watters, eds. ''Encyclopedia of New England'' (Yale U.P. 2005), 1596 pp; the major scholarly resource to the geography, history and culture of the region ISBN 0300100272

Bartlett, Ray et al. ''New England Trips''. ISBN 1-74179-728-4

Berman, Eleanor. ''Eyewitness Travel Guides New England''. ISBN 0-7566-2697-8

Chenoweth, James. ''Oddity Odyssey: A Journey Through New England's Colorful Past''. Holt, 1996. Humorous travel guide. ISBN 0-8050-3671-7

Muse, Vance. ''The Smithsonian Guide to Historic America: Northern New England''. Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 1998. A photographic guide to historic sites in New England. ISBN 1-55670-635-9

Riess, Jana. ''The Spiritual Traveler Boston and New England: A Guide to Sacred Sites and Peaceful Places'', HiddenSpring ISBN 1-58768-008-4

Sletcher, Michael. ''New England: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of American Regional Cultures'' (2004)

Wiencek, Henry. ''The Smithsonian Guide to Historic America: Southern New England''. Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 1998. A photographic guide to historic sites in New England. ISBN 1-55670-633-2

External links

;Political

New England Governors Conference

;Historic

Historic New England*Maps

Historic USGS Maps of New England & NY

of New England. From the 1871 Atlas of Massachusetts by Walling and Gray.

;Culture

New England Music Archive

Related information

Category:Census regions of the United States Category:Regions of the United States

af:Nieu-Engeland ar:نيو إنجلاند ast:Nueva Inglaterra be-x-old:Новая Ангельшчына br:Bro-Saoz Nevez bg:Нова Англия ca:Nova Anglaterra cv:Çĕнĕ Англи cs:Nová Anglie cy:Lloegr Newydd da:New England de:Neuengland et:Uus-Inglismaa el:Νέα Αγγλία es:Nueva Inglaterra eo:Nov-Anglio eu:Ingalaterra Berria fa:ایالت‌های نیو انگلند آمریکا fo:Nýongland fr:Nouvelle-Angleterre ga:Sasana Nua gd:Sasainn Nuadh gl:Nova Inglaterra ko:뉴잉글랜드 hr:Nova Engleska id:New England is:Nýja England it:New England he:ניו אינגלנד ka:ახალი ინგლისი sw:New England la:Nova Anglia lv:Jaunanglija lt:Naujoji Anglija li:Nui Ingeland hu:New England mr:न्यू इंग्लंड ms:New England nl:New England (Verenigde Staten) ja:ニューイングランド no:New England nn:New England pl:Nowa Anglia pt:Nova Inglaterra ro:Noua Anglie ru:Новая Англия simple:New England sk:Nové Anglicko sl:Nova Anglija sr:Нова Енглеска fi:Uusi-Englanti sv:New England th:นิวอิงแลนด์ tr:Yeni İngiltere uk:Нова Англія vec:New England vi:New England zh-yue:紐英倫 zh:新英格蘭

Coordinates

°′″N°′″N

{{infobox musical artist | name

Kirsty MacColl | image Kirsty_MacColl_at_Double_Door_Chicago.png | caption Kirsty MacColl at the Double Door in Chicago | background solo_singer | birth_name Kirsty Anna MacColl | birth_date October 10, 1959 Croydon, England, United Kingdom | death_date December 18, 2000 Cozumel, Mexico | genre New Wave, Pop, Rock, Country, Folk, World Music | occupation Singer, songwriter | years_active 1979–2000 | label Stiff, Polydor, IRS, ZTT, V2 | website KirstyMacColl.com }}

Kirsty Anna MacColl (10 October 1959 – 18 December 2000) was an English singer-songwriter.

MacColl scored several pop hits from the early 1980s to the early 1990s. During this era, she often sang on recordings produced by her husband Steve Lillywhite, notably those of The Smiths and the song "Fairytale of New York" by The Pogues.

MacColl was killed in a controversial boating incident in Mexico.

Life and career

Early career

Kirsty MacColl was the daughter of folk singer Ewan MacColl and dancer Jean Newlove. She and her brother, Hamish MacColl, grew up with their mother in Croydon, where she attended Park Hill Primary School and Monks Hill High School, making appearances in school plays. At the time of MacColl's birth, her father had been in a relationship with folksinger, multi-instrumentalist and songwriter Peggy Seeger since 1956 (a relationship that would continue until his death in 1989), and already had a son with her.

She came to notice when Chiswick Records released an EP by local punk rock band the Drug Addix with MacColl on backing vocals under the pseudonym Mandy Doubt (1978). Stiff Records executives were not impressed with the band, but liked her and subsequently signed her to a solo deal.

Debut single

Her debut solo single "They Don't Know", released in 1979, peaked at number 2 in terms of airplay on the Music Week airplay chart. However, a distributors' strike prevented copies of the single getting into record stores, and the single consequently failed to appear on the UK Singles Chart.

MacColl recorded a follow-up single, "You Caught Me Out", but felt she lacked Stiff's full backing, and left the label shortly before the song was to be released. The single was pulled, and only a few "white label" promo copies of the single are known to exist.

MacColl moved to Polydor Records in 1981. She had a UK number 14 hit with "There's a Guy Works Down the Chip Shop Swears He's Elvis", taken from her critically acclaimed debut album ''Desperate Character''. In 1983, Polydor dropped her just as she had completed recording the songs for a planned second album (to be called ''Real'') which used more synthesizers and had New Wave-styled tracks. She returned to Stiff, where pop singles such as "Terry" and "He's On the Beach" were unsuccessful but a cover of Billy Bragg's "A New England" in 1985 got to Number 7 in the UK charts. This included two extra verses specially written for her by Bragg. Also around this time, MacColl wrote and performed the theme song "London Girls" for Channel 4's short-lived sitcom ''Dream Stuffing'' (1984).

In the United States, MacColl was probably most recognisable as the writer of "They Don't Know". Tracey Ullman's version, helped by a video guest-starring Paul McCartney, reached Number 2 in the UK in 1983 and the Top Ten in North America. It was also played over the closing credits of Ullman's HBO show ''Tracey Takes On'' in 1996. Ullman also recorded three more of MacColl's songs, "You Broke My Heart In 17 Places" and "You Caught Me Out", as the title tracks of her first and second albums respectively, and "Terry" which was released as a single in 1985.

Chart re-emergence

When Stiff went bankrupt in 1986, MacColl was left unable to record in her own right, as no record company bought her contract from the Official Receiver. However, she had regular session work as a backing vocalist, and she frequently sang on records produced or engineered by her husband, Steve Lillywhite, including tracks for Robert Plant, The Smiths, Talking Heads, Big Country, Crossfire Choir, Anni-Frid Lyngstad (of ABBA), and The Wonder Stuff among others. She appeared in the videos "Welcome to the Cheap Seats" for The Wonder Stuff and "(Nothing But) Flowers" for Talking Heads (along with ex-The Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr).

MacColl re-emerged in the British charts in December 1987, reaching Number 2 with The Pogues on "Fairytale of New York", a duet with Shane MacGowan. This led to her accompanying The Pogues on their British and European tour in 1988, an experience which she said helped her temporarily overcome her stage fright. In March 1989, MacColl sang backing vocals on the Happy Mondays' ''Hallelujah'' EP.

After the contract issue was resolved, MacColl returned to recording as a solo artist and received critical acclaim upon the release of ''Kite'' (LP) in 1989. The album was widely praised by critics, and featured collaborations with David Gilmour and Johnny Marr. MacColl's lyrics addressed life in Margaret Thatcher's Britain on "Free World", ridiculed the vapidity of fame in "Fifteen Minutes", and addressed the vagaries of love in "Don't Come The Cowboy With Me Sonny Jim!" Although ''Kite'' contained many original compositions, MacColl's biggest chart success from the album would be the cover of The Kinks' song "Days", which gave her a UK Top 20 hit in July 1989. A bonus track on the CD version of ''Kite'' was a cover of the Smiths song "You Just Haven't Earned It Yet, Baby".

During this time, MacColl was also featured on the British sketch comedy ''French and Saunders'', appearing as herself, singing songs including "15 Minutes" and "Don't Come The Cowboy With Me Sunny Jim!" (from ''Kite''), "Still Life" (the B-side of the "Days" single), "Girls On Bikes" (a reworking of B-side "Am I Right?") and, with comedy duo Raw Sex, the Frank and Nancy Sinatra hit "Something Stupid". She continued to write and record, releasing the album ''Electric Landlady'' (coined by Johnny Marr, a play on the Jimi Hendrix album title ''Electric Ladyland''), including her most successful chart hit in North America, "Walking Down Madison" (co-written with Marr and a Top 30 hit in the UK), in 1991. Despite the song's U.S. chart success, ''Landlady'' was not a hit for Virgin Records, and in 1992, when Virgin was sold to EMI, MacColl was dropped from the label.

Later work

She released ''Titanic Days'', informed by her failing marriage with Lillywhite, in 1993, but ZTT Records had agreed only to release the album as a "one-off" and declined to sign her to a contract. In 1995, she released two new singles on Virgin, "Caroline" and a cover of Lou Reed's "Perfect Day" (a duet with Evan Dando), together with the "best of" compilation ''Galore''.

''Galore'' became MacColl's only album to reach the top 10 in the UK Albums Chart, but neither of the new singles, nor a re-released "Days", made the Top 40. MacColl would not record again for several years; her frustration with the music business was exacerbated by a lengthy case of writer's block. MacColl herself admitted that she was ready to give up her music career and become an English teacher in South America.

In 1998, the album ''What Do Pretty Girls Do?'' was released, containing BBC Radio 1 live sessions (featuring Billy Bragg on two songs) that were broadcast between 1989 and 1995.

After several trips to Cuba and Brazil, MacColl recorded the world music-inspired (particularly Cuban and other Latin American forms) ''Tropical Brainstorm'', which was released in 2000 to critical acclaim. It included the song "In These Shoes", which garnered airplay in the U.S., was covered by Bette Midler and featured in the HBO show ''Sex and the City''. It would later (after MacColl's death) be adopted by Catherine Tate as the theme tune for her BBC TV show and feature on the soundtrack to British film ''Kinky Boots''.

TV work

MacColl featured regularly in the third series of the ''French and Saunders Show'', a comedy show on the BBC. Unlike other guests on the show, she was not part of any of the sketches but would sing her songs whilst performing as in a music video. She also made regular appearances on Jools Holland's TV shows, also on the BBC, notably singing during the 1995 ''Hootenanny'', an unusual rendition of "Miss Otis Regrets" with the Pipes and Drums of the Irish Guards.

Death and its aftermath

Death

In 2000, following her participation in the presentation of a radio programme she had done for the BBC on Cuba, MacColl took a holiday in Cozumel, Mexico, with her sons and her partner, musician James Knight. On 18 December 2000, she and her sons went diving in Cozumel, in a specific diving area that watercraft were restricted from entering. With the group was a local veteran divemaster, Iván Díaz. As the group was surfacing from a dive, a speeding powerboat entered the restricted area. MacColl saw the boat coming before her sons did; Louis was not in the boat's path, but Jamie was. She was able to push him out of the way (he sustained minor head and rib injuries) but in doing so, she was hit by the boat and killed instantly. MacColl's remains were repatriated to the United Kingdom and the subsequent funeral took place at Mortlake Crematorium in London.

The boat involved in the accident was owned by Mexican supermarket millionaire Guillermo González Nova, who was on board with several members of his family. An employee of González Nova's, boathand José Cen Yam, claimed to have been driving the boat at the time that the accident occurred. Several published reports have included accounts from eyewitnesses that have stated Cen Yam was not at the controls; eyewitnesses also indicate that the boat was travelling much faster than the speed of one knot that Nova had claimed. Cen Yam was found guilty of culpable homicide and was sentenced to 2 years 10 months in prison. He was allowed under Mexican law to pay a punitive fine of 1,034 pesos (about €63, £61, or US$90) in lieu of the prison sentence. He was also ordered to pay approximately US$2,150 in restitution to MacColl's family, an amount based on his wages. Published reports have included statements from people who spoke to Cen Yam after the accident, claiming Cen Yam had received money for taking the blame for the incident.

Aftermath

Justice For Kirsty campaign

MacColl's family launched the Justice For Kirsty campaign in response to the events surrounding her death. Among the group's efforts:

Lawyers for MacColl's family and the group campaigned for a judicial review into the events surrounding her death. They were in repeated contact with the Mexican government, and made an application to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

MacColl's friends and family were critical of what they perceived as a lack of cooperation from the Mexican authorities. In May 2006, Emilio Cortez Ramírez, a federal prosecutor in Cozumel, was found liable for breach of authority in conjunction with his handling of the MacColl case. The BBC has featured a documentary by Olivia Lichtenstein, entitled ''Who Killed Kirsty MacColl?'' U2 frontman Bono, who was a friend of MacColl's, spoke about the incident during a concert in Monterrey, Mexico, in February 2006. The Mexican government released a statement after the concert indicating they would take action. In December 2009, it was announced that the Justice For Kirsty campaign was being ended since "the committee was successful in achieving most of its aims" and "it is unlikely that any more could be achieved." The campaign's remaining funds were to be divided between two charities, Casa Alianza Mexico and Cuba Music Solidarity, of which "Kirsty would have approved."

Legacy

Since MacColl's death, Billy Bragg has always included "her" extra verses when performing "A New England". She was honoured in 2002 with a memorial concert in London at the Royal Festival Hall, featuring a number of musicians that had worked with her or been influenced by her. A similar memorial concert was scheduled for her birthday (10 October 2010) at the O2 Shepherds Bush Empire, to support her favourite charity The Music Fund for Cuba.

In 2001, a bench was placed by the southern entrance to London's Soho Square as a memorial to her, after a lyric from one of her most poignant songs: "One day I'll be waiting there / No empty bench in Soho Square". Every year on the Sunday nearest to MacColl's birthday, 10 October, fans from all over the world hold a gathering at the bench to pay tribute to her and sing her songs.

MacColl continues to receive media exposure; in 2004, ''Kirsty MacColl:The One and Only,'' a biography of MacColl written by Karen O'Brien, was published. A retrospective three-CD set spanning her full career, ''From Croydon To Cuba,'' was released in 2005. ''Titanic Days'' was re-released in 2005 as a deluxe 2CD set, and ''Kite'' and ''Electric Landlady'' were also remastered and rereleased with additional tracks. Her first album, ''Desperate Character,'' remained out of print as of late June 2010, but some selections from that work were included in the box set. On 7 August 2005, ''The Best of Kirsty MacColl,'' a single-disc compilation that included a "new" single, "Sun on the Water," made its debut on the UK album charts at number 17, climbing to #12 a week later.

MacColl's collaboration with the Pogues, "Fairytale of New York," remains a perennial Christmas favourite. In 2004, 2005 and 2006, it was voted favourite Christmas song in a poll by music video channel VH1. The song was re-released in the UK in December 2005, with proceeds being split between the Justice for Kirsty Campaign and charities for the homeless. The re-release reached number 3 on the UK charts, and spent five weeks in the top 75 over the Christmas and New Year period. It reached the top 10 for the third time in its history in 2006, peaking at number 6, and charted yet again in December 2007, when there was brief controversy over the use of the word 'faggot' in the lyrics, which BBC Radio 1 dubbed out "to avoid offence," 20 years after it had first passed over the airwaves without comment (or apparent offence, although the rhyme had been changed to "haggard" for a St Patrick's Day concert in 1998); following criticism from listeners and MacColl's mother, Radio 1 reversed their decision later in the day. The song has also made the Top 20 in the two subsequent years, and has now charted in eight separate years. With the exception of the 2005 re-release, the seasonal re-charting in the 21st century is due to download sales, and not due to further releases (download sales counting toward the singles chart since 2005).

Discography

Albums

Release Date	Album	UK Albums Chart
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Compilation albums

Release Date	Album	UK Albums Chart	Noted
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Singles

Year	Song	UK Singles Chart	!align="center" valign="top" width="40"	Album
June 1979	align="left" valign="top"	align="center" valign="top"
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rowspan="2"
February 1981		align="center" valign="top"
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May 1981
September 1981		align="center" valign="top"
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November 1981		align="center" valign="top"
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rowspan="6"
1983	align="left" valign="top"	align="center" valign="top"
align="center" valign="top"
August 1983		align="center" valign="top"
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October 1983	align="left" valign="top"		align="center" valign="top"
December 1984
June 1985		align="center" valign="top"
align="center" valign="top"
November 1987
March 1989			align="center" valign="top"
June 1989	align="left" valign="top"
September 1989			align="center" valign="top"
April 1990			align="center" valign="top"
November 1990	align="left" valign="top"		align="center" valign="top"
May 1991
July 1991			align="center" valign="top"
September 1991		align="center" valign="top"
align="center" valign="top"
November 1991
November 1993		align="center" valign="top"
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February 1995			align="center" valign="top"
June 1995	align="left" valign="top"		align="center" valign="top"
July 1995			align="center" valign="top"
November 1999			align="center" valign="top"
February 2000			align="center" valign="top"
July 2005		align="center" valign="top"
align="center" valign="top"
December 2005

Bibliography

References

External links

Kirsty MacColl — official site

Kirsty MacColl discography at Discogs

BBC announcement of her death

Justice for Kirsty – in-depth information regarding MacColl's death

Official Justice For Kirsty on Myspace

Category:English female singers Category:English pop singers Category:English singer-songwriters Category:English songwriters Category:English people of Scottish descent Category:ZTT Records artists Category:People from Croydon Category:1959 births Category:2000 deaths Category:Underwater diving deaths Category:Accidental deaths in Mexico

de:Kirsty MacColl es:Kirsty MacColl fr:Kirsty McColl ga:Kirsty MacColl it:Kirsty MacColl nl:Kirsty MacColl no:Kirsty MacColl sv:Kirsty MacColl

Coordinates	°′″N°′″N
Name	Billy Bragg
Background	solo_singer
Birth name	Stephen William Bragg
Born	December 20, 1957Barking, London, England
Instrument	Vocals, guitar
Genre	Folk punkFolk rockAlternative rock
Years active	1977–present
Associated acts	The BlokesRiff-RaffWilco
Website	billybragg.co.uk
Notable instruments	}}

Stephen William Bragg (born 20 December 1957), better known as Billy Bragg, is an English alternative rock musician and left wing activist. His music blends elements of folk music, punk rock and protest songs, and his lyrics mostly deal with political or romantic themes. His music career has lasted more than 30 years.

Early life

Bragg was born in 1957 in Barking, Essex, the son of Dennis Frederick Austin Bragg, an assistant sales manager to a Barking cap and hat maker, and his wife, Marie Victoria D'Urso. Bragg was educated at Barking Abbey Secondary School in Barking.

Career

In 1977, Bragg formed the punk rock/pub rock band Riff Raff, and toured London's pubs and clubs. The band released a series of singles, which did not receive wide exposure. He also worked in Guy Norris Records in Barking. Bragg became disillusioned with his music career, and in May 1981 joined the British Army as a recruit destined for the Queen's Royal Irish Hussars of the Royal Armoured Corps. After three months, he bought his way out of the army for £175 and returned home, having attended basic training but having never served in a regiment as a soldier.

Bragg began performing frequent concerts and busking around London, playing solo with an electric guitar. His roadie at the time was Andy Kershaw, who became a BBC DJ (Bragg and Kershaw later, in 1989, appeared in an episode of the BBC TV programme, "Great Journeys", in which they travelled the Silver Road from Potosí, Bolivia, to the Pacific coast at Arica, Chile).

Bragg's demo tape initially got no response from the record industry, but by pretending to be a television repair man, he got into the office of Charisma Records' A&R; man Peter Jenner. Jenner liked the tape, but the company was near bankruptcy and had no budget to sign new artists. Bragg got an offer to record more demos for a music publisher, so Jenner agreed to release them as a record. ''Life's a Riot with Spy Vs. Spy'' was released in July 1983 by Charisma's new imprint, Utility. Hearing DJ John Peel mention on-air that he was hungry, Bragg rushed to the BBC with a mushroom biryani, so Peel played a song from ''Life's a Riot with Spy Vs. Spy'' although at the wrong speed (since the 12" LP was, unconventionally, cut to play at 45rpm). Peel insisted he would have played the song even without the biryani and later played it at the correct speed.

Within months, Charisma had been taken over by Virgin Records and Jenner, who had been laid off, became Bragg's manager. Stiff Records' press officer Andy Macdonald – who was setting up his own record label, Go! Discs – received a copy of ''Life's a Riot with Spy Vs. Spy''. He made Virgin an offer and the album was re-released on Go! Discs in November 1983. In 1984, he released ''Brewing Up with Billy Bragg'', a mixture of political songs (e.g., "It Says Here") and songs of unrequited love (e.g., "The Saturday Boy"). The following year he released ''Between the Wars'', an EP of political songs that included a cover version of Leon Rosselson's "The World Turned Upside Down" – the EP made the top 20 of the UK Singles Chart and earned Bragg an appearance on ''Top of the Pops''. Bragg later collaborated with Rosselson on the song, "Ballad of the Spycatcher". In 1985, his song "A New England", with an additional verse, became a Top 10 hit in the UK for Kirsty MacColl. After MacColl's early death, Bragg always sang the extra verse in her honour. In 1984–1985 he toured North America.

In 1986, Bragg released ''Talking with the Taxman about Poetry'', which became his first Top 10 album. Its title is taken from a poem by Vladimir Mayakovsky and a translated version of the poem was printed on the record's inner sleeve. ''Back to Basics'' is a 1987 collection of his first three releases: ''Life's A Riot With Spy Vs. Spy'', ''Brewing Up with Billy Bragg'', and the ''Between The Wars EP''. Bragg released his fourth album, ''Workers Playtime'', in September 1988. With this album, Bragg added a backing band and accompaniment. In May 1990, Bragg released the political mini-LP, ''The Internationale''. The songs were, in part, a return to his solo guitar style, but some songs featured more complicated arrangements and included a brass band. The album paid tribute to one of Bragg's influences with the song, "I Dreamed I Saw Phil Ochs Last Night", which is an adapted version of Earl Robinson's song, "I Dreamed I Saw Joe Hill Last Night", itself an adaptation of a poem by Alfred Hayes.

The album ''Don't Try This at Home'' was released in September 1991, and included the song, "Sexuality", which reached the UK Singles Chart. Bragg had been persuaded by Go! Discs' Andy and Juliet Macdonald to sign a four-album deal with a million pound advance, and a promise to promote the album with singles and videos. This gamble was not rewarded with extra sales, and the situation put the company in financial difficulty. In exchange for ending the contract early and repaying a large amount of the advance, Bragg regained all rights to his back catalogue. Bragg continued to promote the album with his backing band, The Red Stars, which included his Riff Raff colleague and long-time roadie, Wiggy.

Bragg released the album ''William Bloke'' in 1996 after taking time off to help raise his son. Around that time, Nora Guthrie (daughter of American folk artist Woody Guthrie) asked Bragg to set some of her father's unrecorded lyrics to music. The result was a collaboration with the band Wilco and Natalie Merchant (with whom Bragg had worked previously). They released the album ''Mermaid Avenue'' in 1998, and ''Mermaid Avenue Vol. II'' in 2000. A rift with Wilco over mixing and sequencing the album led to Bragg recruiting his own band, The Blokes, to promote the album. The Blokes included keyboardist Ian McLagan, who had been a member of Bragg's boyhood heroes The Faces. The documentary film Man in the Sand depicts the roles of Nora Guthrie, Bragg, and Wilco in the creation of the Mermaid Avenue albums.

In 2004, Bragg joined Florida ska-punk band Less Than Jake to perform a version of 'The Brightest Bulb Has Burned Out' for the ''Rock Against Bush'' compilation.

At the 2005 Beautiful Days Festival in Devon, Bragg teamed up with the Levellers to perform a short set of songs by The Clash in celebration of Joe Strummer's birthday. Bragg performed guitar and lead vocals on "Police and Thieves", and performed guitar and backing vocals on "English Civil War", and "Police on my Back".

In 2007, Bragg moved closer to his English folk music roots by joining the WOMAD-inspired collective The Imagined Village, who recorded an album of updated versions of traditional English songs and dances and toured through that autumn. Bragg released his album ''Mr. Love & Justice'' in March 2008. This was the second Bragg album to be named after a book by Colin MacInnes. In 2008, during the NME Awards ceremony, Bragg sang a duet with British solo act Kate Nash. They mixed up their two greatest hits, Nash playing "Foundations", and Bragg redoing his "A New England". Bragg also collaborated with the poet and playwright, Patrick Jones, who supported Bragg's Tour.

In 2008, Bragg played a small role in Stuart Bamforth's film "''A13: Road Movie''". Bragg is featured alongside union reps, vicars, burger van chefs and Members of Parliament in a film that explored "the overlooked, the hidden and the disregarded."

He was involved in the play ''Pressure Drop'' at the Wellcome Collection in London in April and May 2010. The production, written by Mick Gorden, and billed as "part play, part gig, part installation", featured new songs by Bragg. He performed during the play with his band, and acted as compere.

Bragg curated the Leftfield stage at Glastonbury Festival 2010.

He will also be partaking in the Bush Theatre's 2011 project ''Sixty Six'' where he has written a piece based upon a chapter of the King James Bible.

Politics

Bragg has been involved with grassroots, broadly leftist, political movements, and this is often reflected in his lyrics. Bragg has recorded and performed cover versions of famous socialist anthems ''The Internationale'' and ''The Red Flag''. Bragg said in an interview: "My theory is this; I'm not a political songwriter. I'm an honest songwriter. I try and write honestly about what I see around me now." In another interview, Bragg said: "I don't mind being labelled a political songwriter. The thing that troubles me is being dismissed as a political songwriter." In an interview with ''Bullz-Eye'', Bragg said:

I would then say that I am Mr. Love and Justice, and to check out the love songs. That’s how I capture people. People do say to me, “I love your songs, but I just can’t stand your politics.” And I say, “Well, Republicans are always welcome. Come on over!” I would hate to stand at the door, saying to people, “Do you agree with these positions? If not, you can’t come in.”

Bragg expressed support for the 1984 miners' strike, and the following year he formed the musicians' alliance Red Wedge, which promoted the Labour Party and discouraged young people from voting for the Conservative Party in the 1987 general election. Following the defeat of the Labour Party and the repeated victory of Margaret Thatcher and her Conservative government, Bragg joined Charter88 to push for a reform of the British political system.

Also during the 1980s, Bragg travelled to the Soviet Union a few times, after Mikhail Gorbachev had started to promote the policies of perestroika and glasnost. During one trip, he was accompanied by MTV, and during another trip he was filmed for the 1998 mini-documentary ''Mr Bragg Goes to Moscow'', by Hannu Puttonen.

In 1999, Bragg appeared before a commission that debated possible reform of the House of Lords.

During the 2001 UK general election, Bragg attempted to combat voter apathy by promoting tactical voting in an attempt to unseat Conservative Party candidates in Dorset, particularly in South Dorset and West Dorset. The Labour Party won South Dorset with their smallest majority, and the Conservative majority in West Dorset was reduced.

Bragg has developed an interest in English national identity, apparent in his 2002 album ''England, Half-English'' and his 2006 book ''The Progressive Patriot''. The book expressed his view that English socialists can reclaim patriotism from the right wing. He draws on Victorian poet Rudyard Kipling for an inclusive sense of Englishness. Bragg has participated in a series of debates with members of the Socialist Workers Party who disagree with his argument. Bragg also supports Scottish independence.

Bragg has been an outspoken opponent of fascism, racism, bigotry, sexism and homophobia, and is a supporter of a multi-racial Britain. As a result, Bragg has come under attack from far right groups such as the British National Party. In a 2004 ''The Guardian'' article, Bragg was quoted as saying:

The British National Party would probably make it into a parliament elected by proportional representation, too. It would shine a torch into the dirty little corner where the BNP defecate on our democracy, and that would be much more powerful than duffing them up in the street – which I'm also in favour of.

Also in 2004, Bragg collaborated with American ska punk band Less Than Jake to record a song for the ''Rock Against Bush'' compilation album.

During the 2005 general election campaign in the Bethnal Green and Bow constituency, Bragg supported Oona King, a pro-Iraq war Labour candidate, over George Galloway, an anti-war Respect Party candidate, due to a belief that splitting the left-wing vote would allow the Conservatives to win the seat. Galloway overturned King's 10,000-strong majority to become his party's only MP.

In March 2006, journalist Garry Bushell (a former Trotskyist who ran as a candidate for the English Democrats in 2005) accused Bragg of "pontificating on a South London council estate when we all know he lives in a lovely big house in West Dorset".

In January 2010, Bragg announced that he would withhold his income tax as a protest against the Royal Bank of Scotland's plan to pay bonuses of approximately of £1.5 billion to staff in its investment banking business. Bragg set up a Facebook group, made appearances on radio and television news programmes, and made speech at Speakers' Corner in London's Hyde Park. Bragg said,“Millions are already facing stark choices: are they willing to work longer hours for less money, or would they rather be unemployed? I don’t see why the bankers at RBS shouldn’t be asked the same.”

On the eve of the 2010 general election, Bragg announced that he would be voting for the Liberal Democrats because "they've got the best manifesto". He also backed the Lib Dems for tactical voting reasons. Bragg later expressed disappointment with the party, stating that 'the Lib Dems had failed democracy'.

Bragg was also very active in his hometown of Barking as part of Searchlight's Hope not Hate campaign, where the BNP's leader Nick Griffin was standing for election. At one point during the campaign Bragg squared up to BNP London Assembly Member Richard Barnbrook, calling him a "Fascist Racist" and saying "when you're gone from this borough, we will rebuild this community". The BNP came third on election day.

Bragg is a board director and key spokesman for the Featured Artists Coalition, a body representing the rights of recording artists. Bragg founded the organisation Jail Guitar Doors, which supplies instruments to prisoners to encourage them to address problems in a non-confrontational way.

Bragg is a regular at the Tolpuddle Martyrs' Festival, an annual event celebrating the memory of those transported to Australia for founding a union in the 1830s.

In January 2011, news sources reported that 20 to 30 residents of Bragg's Dorset hometown, Burton Bradstock, had received anonymous letters viciously attacking Bragg and his politics, and urging residents to oppose him in the village. Bragg claimed that a BNP supporter was behind the letters, which argued that Bragg is a hypocrite for advocating socialism while living a wealthy lifestyle, and referred to him as anti-British and pro-immigration.

In July 2011 Billy joined the growing protests over the News of the World phone hacking affair with the recording of "Never Buy the Sun" which references many of the scandals key points including the Milly Dowler case, police bribes and associated political fallout. It also draws on the 22 year Liverpool boycott of ''The Sun'' for their coverage of the Hillsborough Disaster.

Discography

''Life's a Riot with Spy Vs Spy'' (1983)

''Brewing Up with Billy Bragg'' (1984)

''Talking with the Taxman about Poetry'' (1986)

''Back to Basics'' (1987)

''Workers Playtime'' (1988)

''The Internationale'' (1990)

''Don't Try This at Home'' (1991)

''William Bloke'' (1996)

''Bloke on Bloke'' (1997)

''Mermaid Avenue'' (1998) (with Wilco)

''Mermaid Avenue Vol. II'' (2000) (with Wilco)

''England, Half-English'' (2002) (with the Blokes)

''Mr. Love & Justice'' (2008)

Further reading

Billy Bragg, ''The Progressive Patriot: A Search for Belonging'' (London: Bantam Press, 2006) ISBN 978-0-593-05343-0

Billy Bragg, ''How we all lost when Thatcher won'': (guardian.co.uk, 5 March 2009)

See also

Red Wedge

Charter88

George Gimarc

References

External links

Braggtopia

Billy Bragg collection at the Internet Archive's live music archive

Billy Bragg's Big Busk At Lincoln Center, 27 July 2011

Category:1957 births Category:Alternative rock musicians Category:Anti-corporate activists Category:Anti-fascists Category:British socialists Category:English activists Category:English buskers Category:English-language singers Category:English male singers Category:English political writers Category:English singer-songwriters Category:English socialists Category:English tax resisters Category:Living people Category:People associated with Oxford Brookes University Category:People from Barking Category:Folk punk musicians Category:Live Music Archive artists

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