Watching the English

THE MEANING OF CHIPS

The SIRC research report on The Meaning of Chips dealt with a food issue of great national importance. Ninety percent of us are chip eaters, the majority indulging at least once a week, and the chip is a vital part of English heritage, but little was known, until the SIRC study, about our relationship with the chip, its role in our social interactions, and its place in the cultural Zeitgeist.

Chips, Patriotism and English Empiricism

Although chips were invented in Belgium, and are popular (as French-fries, frites, patate frite, patatas fritas, etc.) in many other parts of the world, we found that English people tend to think of them as British or, rather more specifically, English. 'Fish and chips' is still regarded as the English national dish. The English are not normally inclined to be either patriotic or passionate about food but we found that they could be surprisingly patriotic and enthusiastic about the humble chip.

'The chip is down to earth,' explained one of our focus-group participants. 'It's basic, it's simple in a good way, which is why we like the chip. We have that quality and it's a good quality... This is what we are - no faffing about.' It hadn't occurred to me that a chunk of fried potato could so eloquently express the earthy empiricism and no-nonsense realism that I had tentatively identified as defining characteristics of Englishness, so I was grateful to him for this insight.

Chip-sharing Rules and Sociability

Chips are also an important social facilitator. This is the only English food that actually lends itself to sharing, and that the unwritten rules allow us to share. When we are eating chips, you will often see the English behaving in a very sociable, intimate, un-English manner: all pitching in messily to eat with our fingers off the same plate or out of the same bag, pinching chips off each other's plates - and even feeding chips to each other. Normally, even with foods that are supposed to be shared, such as Chinese or Indian, the English stick to the practice of each person ordering his or her own dish. But chips seem to promote sociability, which for many English people is part of their attraction - perhaps because we have a greater need than other nations for props and facilitators that encourage 'commensality'.