“The Real Royalists”: Folk Performance and Civil Religion at Royal Visits

Abstract

Introduction In the study of cultures other than our own, high levels of interest (whether positive or negative) are taken as indicators of a culturally significant phenomenon worthy of serious investigation (Ortner 1979). Somewhat surprisingly in our own culture, despite the high levels of media and public interest in the monarchy, has been a distinct lack of academic interest in popular royalism. Since 1953, the year of the present Queen's coronation, the body of specific academic literature generated amounts to little more than a handful of books and a relatively small number of articles. These have been spread over a range of disciplines; for example, anthropology, sociology, history, social psychology and political science. Recent years have seen what may be the start of a more sustained interest in the topic with the publishing of books dealing specifically with the modern monarchy (for example, Hayden 1987; Nairn 1988; Wilson 1989; Billig 1992; Prochaska 1995). Most recently the scale of public mourning for Diana Princess of Wales has produced a flurry of academic work, but whether this develops into a sustained interest in the monarchy remains to be seen. If commentaries on popular monarchy are scarce, then qualitative studies of how people actually interact with the monarchy are very scarce indeed. Humphrey Jennings and Charles Madge have republished the Mass Observation diaries for the Coronation of George VI but, although fascinating, this material is now over sixty years old Jennings and Madge 1987). Michael Billig provides a recent exception, but he is concerned with everyday conversation rather than responses to ceremonial (Billig 1992). Therefore, information on the experience of how the public actually interact with royal ceremonial is seriously lacking. This paper addresses, but does not claim to fill, this gap. Rather, by describing how one particular group of people interact with the monarchy, the aim is to illustrate the richness of the material and in doing so to suggest the value of developing this field of research further. The Royalists The real who are the focus of the paper are people who regularly travel the United Kingdom, to stand for hours, in all weathers, to greet members of the Royal Family during royal visits. Though living in different parts of the country, they have come to know each other through regular attendance at these events. However, the size and composition of the group attending a particular visit varies according to family, employment and financial circumstances, and the time and location of the event. Before I met them, my expectations of what constituted a royalist conformed to a common stereotype of middle-aged, middle-class, married, white and female (cf. Rose and Kavanagh 1976). I found, however, that their ages range from mid-teens to late-sixties, and that are almost as many men as women. The majority of the women are married with older children; the majority of the men are single. Occupations range from a florist (male) to a civil engineer (female), and include a shop keeper, a clerical worker, a secretary, a cook, a postman, a nurse, a teacher, housewives and the retired. The royalists claim that there is no such thing as a typical royalist, we are a very mixed bunch. However, this is not quite the case. Class, religion, political and value orientations provide common factors underlying their surface diversities. Although religion and party politics are not often discussed amongst them, the majority affiliation is towards the Church of England and the Conservative Party. As well as sharing these underlying value orientations, through their occupations they share a predominantly lower-middle-class status. One explanation for this may be that their conditions of employment give them the flexibility to take holiday leave, or time off in lieu of overtime, or to re-organise working hours without loss of income or disruption to colleagues, employers or production. …