Burns Night
Burns Night is on Wednesday 25 January
by Brian Radcliffe
Suitable for Whole School (Sec)
Aims
To explore our understanding of national identity.
Preparation and materials
- Optional: you may wish to read a selection of typical Burns Night poems. Some examples are available at: https://tinyurl.com/mspn74zb
Assembly
- For people who have Scottish heritage, and those who enjoy a good night out, Wednesday 25 January is Burns Night.
- The main event of the evening is a Burns supper, which consists of traditional Scottish delicacies.
First, there is soup: Scotch broth, Cullen skink (smoked haddock soup) or cock-a-leekie (chicken and leek).
The main course is the renowned haggis, a huge sausage containing meat, herbs and oatmeal. It is served with ‘neeps and tatties’ (mashed swede and potato). The haggis is brought into the dining room to the skirl of bagpipes. It’s a great ceremony.
For dessert, there is usually tipsy laird, a trifle laced with whisky rather than sherry. In fact, whisky is served with every course of a Burns supper.
The evening entertainment consists of lots of traditional Scottish music, amusing speeches in honour of the food and the company, and readings of Scottish poems. It is all rounded off with an energetic cèilidh (traditional dancing). - Burns Night celebrates the birthday of Robert - or ‘Rabbie’ as he’s usually known - Burns, the national poet of Scotland. He was born in 1759, the son of a farmer in the Scottish Lowlands. He himself worked as a farmer and tax collector, but throughout his life, he wrote poems and songs in the Scottish language. His poetry covered farming life, traditional culture, religion, class and politics. He championed the poor and disenfranchised in their struggles with authority, this authority often being foisted on Scotland from London.
- Burns has become a symbol of Scottish identity, a rallying point for those who support the underdog. Many of his poems are written in Scottish, so they are harder to understand for those who are unfamiliar with the language and its rhythms. They are unique to their country.
Time for reflection
I wonder if we treasure a national identity. Many of us would probably apply different national identities to ourselves.
Invite the students to discuss this and encourage some to share their own national identities.
National identity is seen as essential for a democratic society to flourish: a shared set of values, historical roots and ambitions for the future help to unite a diverse group of people. However, creating a national identity can be hard to achieve. What if your family history goes back beyond the country where you live now? This is a big issue in the UK. Many people identify themselves as Welsh, Irish or Scottish rather than British, and would not want to be termed English. For some of us, our national history belongs abroad: perhaps we have only recently come to the country where we now live.
National identity can also become toxic, as we saw in Germany in the lead-up to the Second World War. Adolf Hitler regarded the Aryan national identity as superior to all others, and sought to wipe out those who shared the Jewish identity.
So, how can we unite in a national identity that enables our society to move forward together? It can’t have much to do with a shared history because the past was a different nation for many of us.
What about our shared present? Do we experience the same pleasures, pressures, hopes and fears as one another? In general, we do, so maybe we can start by identifying as a diverse group of pilgrims on the same road.
What about our shared future? Can we agree on what we’d like our society, our families and ourselves to become in ten years’ time? Again, maybe we can identify as pilgrims heading towards a similar destination. National identity becomes more about what we wish to become.
For the UK to work as a democracy, we need to find some measure of common identity. It may be cobbled together, it may incorporate other national ties, but it’s necessary. We need something to unite us.
Let’s return to Rabbie Burns. At midnight on New Year’s Eve, you may have found yourself joining in with one of his songs without realizing it. The song is ‘Auld lang syne’, which translates as ‘times long past’.
Song/music
‘Auld lang syne’ sung by Dougie MacLean, available at: https://youtu.be/sMFnqj6aFwY (3.52 minutes long)
