My Problem with Britannia

[torque2100.livejournal.com]

I have been a fan of this show since it first started airing.  However, something always bothered me about the Britannians.  They never felt sufficiently British to me.  I mean, no pubs, no pints, no bangers and mash or shepherd's  pie. Not once do you hear the characters say "bloody," "bugger," "Blighty," or "zed." I am an American but I do enjoy BBC comedies and Doctor Who.  I don't claim to be an expert on British culture but a lot of things in Code Geass just felt a bit off.   For starters, why were the stalls at the Ashford festival selling hamburgers and soda pop and not hot cider and scotch eggs or lamb kebabs?  I know the target audience probably has no idea what those things are, but would it hurt the writers or art directors to do a little research?  While we're on the subject of Ashford academy, the teachers were WAYYY too nice.  Teachers at British boarding schools are notorious for being snarky, jaded and cruel.

Furthermore, the Britannian empire is all wrong.  I can accept that they fought off the Romans and have an Emperor instead of a King, but why isn't India part of the Britannian empire?  India was always the Jewel in the British empire's crown.  India was the one conquest that Great Britain was most proud of and seeing a parallel universe British empire without India is kind of jarring.  Furthermore, some humorous references to ridiculously inefficient bureaucracy would have upped the Britishness factor a lot.

Adding to my distress is the english dub.  Not only is it  one the most atrocious pieces of voice work I have ever heard, there is not a single accent to be heard. It even makes sense for the western release.  To American ears, anything said with a British accent automatically sounds intelligent and sophisticated.  I mean, imagine how much cooler the line "destroy shujinko ghetto, leave no one alive." would have sounded said in a classy uppercrust accent.

I suppose you can argue that the target audience for this show wouldn't know any of this, but that's no reason not to include it.  It would have helped to give Britannia a unique feel.   As it  is they seem too much like a generic Zeon clone.

Rant over.

Comments

[michanu.livejournal.com]

Your lj-cut's not working ;_;

[tatooine.livejournal.com]

Britannia is America.

And your LJ cut is broken.

[icki-akki.livejournal.com]

Uh, someone else noted that it actually started in America as opposed tp Europe. I'm going to say that this means that Britannia is actually America.

[heartlaced.livejournal.com]

Actually, I'm pretty sure Britannia isn't England at all; it's America. I think it was explained in an extra that came with one of the DVDs or something? I'll have to check.

[taurusbombshell.livejournal.com]

Using all those British slang words wouldn't make sense in Japanese. The dub however, would have been much better if they had used an accent.

Is it possible that something happened to India? After all, we know that the empire isn't in England right now either.

[moebot.livejournal.com]

You might want to check your facts on... well, a lot of things.

[fox-holland.livejournal.com]

I think Britannia lost much of it's territories(Africa, India, and Australia) after it's defeat in the Napoleonic Wars.

[paralinguistic.livejournal.com]

OKAY OKAY. Let me, as a British person, point out some of the generalisations you make about us while questioning the authenticity of something else.

1. "Bugger", "bloody", maybe. But "Blighty" is a place. There's no reason for it to be dropped into conversation. At all.

2. Hot cider, scotch eggs and lamb kebabs are all examples of things that are definitely NOT sold on stalls in Britain. We like our hamburgers and fizzy pop as much as the next country. We might call them different things, but they're the same - as an addition, if you're talking about the lamb "doner" kebab, it was an import from the east anyway. Hardly authentically british. If you'd said fish and chips, you might've gotten away with it, we're fond of those.

3. School teachers in boarding schools in Britain? Not so bad. I know a few. They aren't any more or less jaded and cruel than any other teachers I know. I live in a town that situates a rather prestigious boarding school, and I can tell you that much easily.

4. Ridiculously inefficient beaurocracy? ... well, I suppose you have a point for now, but Britain was rather efficient back when it had an Empire. Otherwise, it wouldn't have HAD an empire. Kindly exercise common sense.

5. Not everyone in Britain speaks with an uppercrust accent. Not even all the nobility do.

IN SHORT: it might not be best to generalise a country while complaining it isn't being well represented.

[rainbow-cnxn.livejournal.com]

This exact some topic is, like, 2 posts down in this comm. -_-

[epistretes.livejournal.com]

I can't even begin to start telling you how much you're wrong in this post and as an Englishwoman myself, I find it fairly insulting.

[xgraphy.livejournal.com]

This pisses me off.
I'm one for keeping fiction AS FICTION.

Not to mention I've never heard "Blighty" or "zed" used before in my life as a british person.

[victoripenguin.livejournal.com]

Britannia is the Latin word for Brittan (such as Gallia is for Gaul) I take the 'Code Geass' universe to be what the might have been like if the U.S. hadn't beaten England in the American Revolution.

Now even though America speaks English, because of the distance we speak it differently, colonies have their own dialect and accents divergent from the homeland. I think the same principle applies with Area 11, they speak differently because time has passed and they are far, far away from the heart of England.

[snozzlenut.livejournal.com]

I've never been certain either way if Britannia is supposed to be Britain or not, seeing as its fiction i've not cared a great deal, although having the Britannian Knightmares called Glasgow, Gloucester and Sutherland did make me wonder. Any ideas why they are named after places in the UK?
Also, what on earth does zed mean? I don't think I have ever heard anyone say that before :/
As for the stalls, never in my life have I come across a stall sell any of what you have described. We get fast food stalls..crepes..watermelons.. in fact all of our stalls sell foreign food unless its local veg or meat.
I never went to boarding school so I can't comment on that but I really doubt that they're all snarky, jaded and cruel. Kids wouldn't go to private school if that were thi case.

As for the British accent....intelligent and sophisticated? Yeah depends what area you're looking in. My local accent is inbred farmer's We don't be tawking lyk we be pro'er 'telligarnt oooohhh aarrrr. We really don't have the classy accents other's seem to think we have..

[wing-goddessxxx.livejournal.com]

Since this is fiction i didn't think too hard on it... nor cared since it's not real :P

But it is kinda annoying how some people automatically assume and think it's Britain. Over at animenewsnetwork.com a staff reviewer took points off of Code Geass because he kept on comparing it to real life just because of the names such as 'Britannia '.

[soba-noodlez.livejournal.com]

How about we all get off the topic of Britannia being England or whatever. And think of it as a fictional empire (which it is) and wonder about its fictional origins.

[x-reggg.livejournal.com]

as much as i would love to agree with this rant in some way or another, i can't.

it's quite hard to compare the current culture of britain with that in the code geass. the world of code geass is much more like a parallel world, not the exact same world. the chance of getting the exact same culture in two completely different/isolated world is negligible. and the status of brittania is very different to that in current britain. for one, an emperor still reigns. and it's pretty much based on warfare.

personally, i think there's a bit of stereotyping :x not all people who are british have to say 'bloody', and not all people who say 'bloody' are british. there's also enough globalization in this world to safely say hamburgers and soft drinks/soda pop are commonplace. and putting pubs/hot cider would be SLIGHTLY inappropriate, since some of the target audience are kids...

the britannian empire is another issue. if they did fight off the romans, would they have went to conquer india? it's not something we would know.

final conclusion: looking into britannia history too deeply will cause confusion. confusion no good to brain :3

[almaviva90.livejournal.com]

Sufficiently British? Britain is a multicultural society - each person with their own distinctive backgrounds and heritage, with the population ranging from English, Irish, Scottish, Indian, Chinese, etc, and I bet that most of them who *do* deem themselves as British will take offence at the crude generalisation of the population.

I'm sure the majority of Britons nowadays don't say "bloody", "blighty", "tally-ho", "pip-pip", etc. in each and every sentence they care to utter (they would probably be deemed as other-worldly creatures if they did actually do so), nor do they resolutely stick to stereotypical British fare of bangers and mash, scones, ale, fish and chips, tea, etc. as if it was the only source of cuisine they have. I'm sure that the effects of globalisation would have certainly been well-advanced by now.

British boarding schools do strike a visual image of harsh school masters with military-like moustaches, long, austere black robes and a cane to boot but such days are seriously long gone...if you want to go on the subject of Oxbridge professors (I've actually had an interview with one for my university application) and then assume that they're of the same sort, think again. They're immensely friendly and of the genuinely helpful, sincere sort...and I've yet to meet a British teacher which conjures up images of harsh Victorian discipline.

Ah, the subject of accents...Britain has been made up of counties and regions for the longest of times, for centuries, even millennia. If you go up into the north, you might hear a great Yorkshire or Northeastern brogue , go to the south, you'll hear softer, gentler accents - while in London, Cockney accents are still around (remember My Fair Lady and the great Michael Caine?). Not everyone has an uppercrust, sophisticated British accent that simply drips with poshness although perhaps some people might wish it were so, but that's just not the case as with every other country in the world.