"This volume explores the appropriation of the past in modern British culture. Today, at the beginning of a new millennium, the mass media would have us believe that Britain is suffering an identity crisis. If the pundits are correct, we are witnessing a manipulation of British history at the hands of those keen to project a new national image - or in the language of commodification, to "rebrand" Britain.".

"The twelve essays in Singular Continuities take a different tack. They argue that to distinguish between "the new" and "the traditional" in modern English culture often draws a false dichotomy, that Britishness, in fact, has been the product of continuous creation throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The contributors strongly suggest that "tradition" derives from constant reimaginging, if not from calculated invention."--BOOK JACKET.