A Much Contested Border

A Much Contested Border: The Dynamics of Cultural Memory Regarding the Cornwall-Devon Border Kayleigh Milden Institute of Cornish Studies University of Exeter, England Introduction This paper will explore the many 'borders' of Cornwall through the medium of oral testimony and cultural memory. It will analyse the competing discourses about the Cornwall-Devon border and contrast the conflicting spatial identities that exist throughout Cornwall and the Tamar Valley. As we will discover, in the case of the Cornwall-Devon border there not only occur contradictions between the River Tamar being perceived as both a county and a national border, but also a number of contradictions occur within the Tamar borderlands and within Cornwall itself that are created by cultural and ethnic issues. Arguably, Cornwall is currently one of the most exciting places to study border identity. It is a land of paradox which has adopted various images and discourses that both segregate it from England—but also assimilate the 'county' into England. There is a tension between Cornwall existing as a Celtic Nation, and to the other extreme, Cornwall being just another county in the South West of England. Despite Cornwall's constitutional standing as a Duchy, officially Cornwall is part of England and for many people it is perceived as being an English county. On the other hand, Cornwall's Celtic heritage motivates many people in the struggle for political devolution from England, as they passionately believe that Cornwall is culturally and historically, distinct from those across the border—east of the River Tamar. Yet, the construction of ethnicity and the drawing of borders are not as clear-cut as this English-Cornish dichotomy would suggest, for there are myriad competing spatial identities and discourses which lie beneath this model. If such approaches are applied to the Cornwall-Devon border, it emerges that a number of social relations and narratives function at various spatial levels, both nationally and locally, externally and internally. Apart from the physical border of the River Tamar, psychosocial borders cut across a number of imagined Cornwalls that distinguish between real Cornwall and the 'other'. As will be discussed, whether through kinship, work, landscape or feelings of exclusion, the 'border' between Cornwall and Devon (and England) is a much contested phenomenon. Shifts in Border Studies Until the turn of the twenty-first century the academic discipline of Cornish Studies was generally focused on a 'macro-centric' perspective; that is, taking Cornwall as a collective whole rather than as a collage of diverse sub-regions within the periphery. New approaches to Cornish Studies, however, are beginning to move away from macro-analysis and consider the micro-level perspective of the subregions within Cornwall. For Bernard Deacon this micro-level dimension is central to his view that spatial issues present a useful agenda for the future of Cornish Studies. Researchers in the field need to recognise that the historical and contemporary life of Cornwall is based on 'processes that operate at different scales: the global, the Cornish and the local' (Deacon 2000). Such approaches inevitably have relevance to the way that 'borders' within Cornwall and Devon are encountered, as we can no longer understand Cornwall as one homogenous territory from Lands End to the Tamar and Cornwall is constructed from myriad subjective discourses and cultural memories. But before exploring the cultural memory of the 'borders' of Cornwall and Devon, it is first necessary to contextualise this, by reviewing recent developments in border studies in regards to discourse and cultural memory theory. Since the 1960s there has been a shift from an interest in what exist within the border to an interest in the border itself. Migration patterns and the globalisation of culture have established new perspectives in order to understand the 'mental borders' within multicultural societies. As Anthony P. Cohen has

demonstrated, borders are 'mental' as well as geographical entities that can shift according to time, place and the subjectivity of each individual (Cohen 1986 and 1992). James Anderson and Liam O'Dowd have shown how borders are 'contradictory' in nature and often fail to fit the 'nation-state ideal of cultural homogeneity, as national borders do not always coincide with the borders of 'culture or ethnicity' (Anderson and O'Dowd 1999(a), 595-6). Scholars have attempted to unravel the socio-linguistic formation of border territories such as Anssi Paasi's study of the Finnish-Russian border. Paasi argues that this border is constructed by a 'set of social practices and discourses', which are not exclusive, rather, 'boundaries exist and gain meanings on different spatial scales, not merely at the state level, but these meanings are ultimately reproduced in local everyday life' (Paasi 1999, 670). Indeed, oral testimony is a valuable medium in which to discover how borders are emotionally experienced. Oral testimony naturally 'gives voice' to multiple narratives and allows us to investigate how competing discourses have been absorbed into peoples' consciousness. The current awareness in 'post-modern borderlands' and the 'border metaphor' can be explored effectively though oral testimony, analysing how individuals construct various borders within their psyche around such categories as race, gender, culture or social background (Refer to Donnan and Wilson 2001, 35-40). In relation to border identity, my own experience of dual Cornish-Devonian descent ultimately influences the nature and interpretation of my research within the Cornish Audio Visual Archive (CAVA). The oral historian Alessandro Portelli agues that the relationship and interaction between the oral historian and the speaker is an intrinsic factor in the creation of historical narratives, in the sense that it modes the responses of both parties and therefore should be duly acknowledged as part of the 'creation' of history (Portelli 1997, 3-88). While working in the Tamar Valley as an oral historian interviewing local horticultural workers, my own sense of connection to the region has inevitably shaped the way I have perceived and created my representations of this area of the border. For example, the importance of family associations in building trust was clear through my own connections with the Studden family (my mother's family name), the majority of who were market gardeners and barge people from Calstock, a village on the Cornish side of the River Tamar (by 'barge people' I mean people who used to transport local produce along the River Tamar by boat). The majority of people I interviewed in the Tamar Valley could make a connection to the Studden family name, and I instantly felt more accepted and trustworthy to these people through merely mentioning my distant family connection. Nonetheless, this may well be my own desire to be welcomed into the community, to 'go back to my roots', and striving to find out more about my own historical (Celtic) identity, which has made me perceive the importance of kinship connections across the border as being a more prolific than they actually are in realty. Furthermore in relation to the methodology of border studies, as I have roots on both sides of the Tamar, I have a complex and dual sense of place. I am therefore perhaps more attuned to perceiving and portraying post-modern or hybrid aspects of Cornish identity, than if I were purely an outsider looking in or an insider looking out, who would arguably possess a more prescribed, rigid idea of Cornish identity. But of course, this also means that I have my own bias and 'mental borders' created by emotional ties to both sides of the Tamar; in this way my research becomes a journey of self exploration, trying to understand my own sense of dual identity and what it means to be a 'border Celt'. Historical Background to the Tamar Border Following the Anglo-Saxon conquests, King Athelstan set the River Tamar as the border between England and Cornwall in approximately the year 936, supposedly (with a few exceptions) separating the ancient Britons of Cornwall from the English of Wessex (Deacon 2004(a)). Nonetheless geographically at least this has not been a static border through the ages. As recently as 1966, parts of Cornish

territory stretched across to the Devon side of the river and vice versa. Since then the geographical border has remained fairly true to the line of the Tamar, but even today there are villages whose spatial proximity continues to straddle both sides of the Cornwall-Devon border. In terms of 'psychological borders' the charting of Cornwall's territory has gone through various historical periods that have created both unity and divorce from neighbouring Devon. One such period of unity would be the one hundred years or so spanning from the middle of the nineteenth to the twentieth century. The Tamar Valley has a rich industrial heritage provided by a landscape that became dominated by mining and horticulture. The expansion of Cornish mining spilled across the Tamar, creating cross-border patterns of trade and migration, to the point where Tavistock (in Devon) 'became to all intents and purposes an eastward extension of the Cornish mining district' (Payton 1993, 226-7). For hundreds of years there had been a horticultural industry in the Tamar Valley, but the market gardening boom really began in the middle of the nineteenth century. The arrival of the Great Western Railway to Plymouth in 1849 and the opening of the Royal Albert Railway Bridge in 1859 linking both sides of the Tamar, meant that produce began to be transported to markets across the country at greater speed (Lewis 2004, 6). The horticultural industry remained a vital part of the local economy and culture for around the next one hundred years, creating a network of cross-border kinship and work ties that have continued to unite both sides of the Valley to the present day. Moreover, the Tamar has not always been a cultural or geopolitical border. Rural East Cornwall and West Devon have historically been linked by a shared religiouspolitical culture that survived longer than in West Cornwall. As Garry Tregidga has noted, by 1945 the traditional Cornish political Liberal-Nonconformist framework only really survived 'in the rural heartland of Liberalism centred on the Cornwall-Devon border [where] religious nonconformity was still a force to be reckoned with' (Tregidga 2000, 112-3). Indeed, the political culture of the Tamar Valley remained relatively unchanged, and it has only been since the General Election of 2005 that the Tamar has returned to being a political border in electoral terms, with all five Cornish parliamentary seats now being held by the Liberal Democrats and the Devon side of the border becoming dominated by the Conservative Party. Nonetheless, although the political culture of both sides of the Tamar Valley remained equivalent throughout much of the post-war period, it also witnessed the beginning of a series of disputes over regional planning strategies that were to lead to as much division as it was unity. From 1945, attempts by Plymouth City Council to form a 'Tamarside Community' that spanned across the border into Cornish territory caused outrage with many local people in the South-East of the county. The opening of the Tamar Road Bridge in 1961 created easier transportation links between Plymouth and Cornwall, causing further anxiety over the demographic and economic impact that this would have upon the eastern part of the Duchy. By the 1960s the emergence of the standard regional planning areas had enmeshed Cornwall within a larger 'South West Region' that spanned an area from Lands End to the northern tip of Gloucestershire (Payton 1993; 229, 231). From then on many of Cornwall's governmental and business institutions began to be amalgamated with Devon; such as the formation of the Devon and Cornwall Police in 1967. Government support of forging links between the two 'counties' caused a great deal of protest from Cornish nationalists, who were angered by Celtic Cornwall's assimilation into another part of England and fearful of the impact this would have upon its economy and identity. The trend to create a Devon-and-Cornwall sub-region, often referred to as 'Devonwall' continued through to the 1990s and still has reverberations to the present day. The animosity regarding territorial politics was exacerbated further due to a number of disputes over the designation of European regional boundaries. In 1978 the Boundary Commission established the European Parliamentary Constituency (EPC) for Cornwall and Plymouth, as basically it had regarded Cornwall as being 'too small' to have its own EPC. A number of Cornish led

campaigns followed and lobbied central government, calling for the formation of a separate Cornish EPC in reflection of the region's economic and cultural distinctiveness (refer to Payton 1993; 233, 224, 136-7, 240-2). Nonetheless, so far such initiatives have been fruitless, and since 1999 Cornwall and Devon have been integrated within a seven seat European Constituency that encompasses the greater 'South West'. Creating Border Narratives: Cornish Nation vs. South West Region Although borders are physical constructs (such as rivers or cordons) they are just as much a mental phenomenon; indeed, to exist borders have to be created somehow within our minds. The borders we create are ultimately influenced by culturally produced 'texts'; these texts, whether written, oral or visual dictate where the border lies between 'us' and 'them'. Post-structural and post-modern approaches demonstrate that textual ideologies are dispersed beyond the covers of books and begin to 'function as agents of social reproduction', through what Ben Agger terms 'fast capitalism'. He argues that texts are absorbed into the consciousness of everyday life and determine how we interpret the world around us: In fast capitalism the boundary between text and world has blurred to such an extent that it is nearly impossible to identify where text leaves off and world begins (Agger 1991, 2). Benedict Anderson has drawn attention to the power of what he calls 'print capitalism' on the formation of 'imagined communities', in other words, the influence of mass publishing creating illusory identities (Anderson 1991). The more an individual is exposed to the multiplicity of discourses throughout life, the more fragmentary and complex identity becomes, particularly in the multi-media age. The impact of the mass media and cultural texts on Cornish identity is particularly prolific, as the market is saturated with books on Cornwall which prove very popular with the general public. Rob Burton has termed the authors of publications on Cornish heritage and identity 'Cultural Entrepreneurs', a business that has become an influential medium within the region's psyche (Burton 1997, 151-61). The Institute of Cornish Studies has also reinforced the concept of Cornish identity within the populous; part funded by Cornwall County Council, the Institute has always had a community as well as an academic face. Cultural entrepreneurship is not just active in books, as the 'Cornish Movement' has become increasingly popular in the last decade or so, and there is a plethora of Cornish regalia such as flags, tartan and Kernow car stickers marketed throughout the land. Nonetheless, despite the manufacturing of 'Cornishness', as will be discussed, the cohesiveness of one Cornish identity is largely a myth, as there are a diversity of 'Cornwalls' to be found within the region and its borders. While there has been a recent interest in the sub-regions within Cornwall, when it comes to the issue of the Cornwall-Devon (English) border, arguably the 'narrative' of Cornish Studies has tended to take a 'Kernow-centric' stance. Bernard Deacon has attempted to examine the 'competing discourses' regarding the Cornish border being a 'Celtic frontier' or a 'county boundary' during the nineteenth century (Deacon 2004(a)). Yet this study is still largely centred on the division at the Tamar between the whole Cornish (Celtic) nation from the English nation on the other side of the river. Although Deacon highlights the need for a 'more culturally sensitive approach to borders', he does not focus on the complexities of identity within the borderland area itself. Within the Cornish nationhood narrative, the raison d'être of the Tamar as a territorial, ethnic and constitutional border is paramount. The importance of the Tamar as a 'national' border separating Cornwall from England is demonstrated in the following extract by Philip Payton (Director of the Institute of Cornish Studies):

Certainly, by the end of the tenth century the territorial extent of modern Cornwall had been established, the Athelstan settlement setting the River Tamar as the divide between Celt and Saxon and investing the territory of Cornwall with an enduring identity... (Payton 1993, 225). This extract reveals how the grand narrative of the 'Cornish Nation' has used a discourse of segregation and difference from those on the other side of the Tamar. Words such as 'territory' and 'division' are common denominators of this narrative, which needs to justify Cornwall's standing as an independent nation— with a national border. Other common elements in this narrative are the emphasising of the Tamar as an 'enduring' and 'established' border that has continued to separate the 'Celtic' Cornish from the 'Saxon' English. This cultural memory tends to focus on ancient history to legitimise the standing of the Tamar border, espousing a time when the ethnic and constitutional boundaries between the Celtic and Saxon people appear to have been the most pronounced. Paasi, Anderson and O'Dowd have all demonstrated that borders have both 'material and symbolic uses'; borders are often portrayed as 'encapsulating a history of... struggle against "outside" forces, and as marking the limits of the "community" or "society"' (Paasi 1999, Anderson and O'Dowd 1999(b)). As discussed, the Tamar border is not as enduring as the Cornish nationalist narrative would suggest, yet in terms of the creation of cultural memory the river has become the symbolic signifier that defines the 'mental' border between the Cornish and the English on the other side. A Cornish flag on the banks of the River Tamar at Calstock Although the narrative of the Cornish Nation may well be dominant at the micro level of local (Cornish academic) discourse, at the macro level it is the narrative of the 'South West Region' that controls the discourse of the government and media. Local press and television have been criticised for creating a narrative of a 'South West' or 'Westcountry' that shares a homogenous culture and identity (Payton 1993, 233, Deacon 2004 (b)). For example, the road and rail bridges across the Tamar are often featured in opening sequences and backdrops in regional news programmes, arguably undermining the existence of a cultural 'border' and promoting (whether consciously or unconsciously) an image consolidation across the South West Region. Government bodies such as the South West Regional Assembly (SWRA) and the South West of England Regional Development Agency (SWRDA) were established in the late 1990s as a result of initiatives in regional commerce and development policy. The border of the South West Region stretches from the Isles of Scilly and encompasses Gloucestershire, Wiltshire and Dorset, covering an area of 23,829 square kilometres and representing a population of almost five million. A good example of the workings of the 'South West Region' narrative is provided by an excerpt from the website of the SWRA: In early 1998, cross-Party representatives of the Unitary, County and District Councils in the South West, along with representatives of the region's social, economic and environmental interests, came together and agreed to form the South West Regional Chamber. Based on the Government's guidelines and the region's requirements, proposals were drawn up for a regional chamber that would promote the economic, social and environmental well-being of the South West and help build consensus and identity across the region. http://www.southwest-ra.gov.uk This is a narrative that promotes a rhetoric of 'unity' and 'consensus', and maps out spatial identity around the parameters of 'South West', 'regional' 'district' and 'county'. Moreover, this is very much a South West Region within England, and gives little or no acknowledgment of Cornwall's separate identity (or Devon's for that matter). In contrast to the Cornish nationalist discourse, within this

narrative the Tamar is a county rather than a national or ethnic border, and Cornwall is generally subsumed into the greater South West. Reflecting the tone of regional planning strategy of between the 1960s and 1990s, the South West Region narrative continues to emphasise the interdependency of the counties within its border, and the need for cooperation for the good of the whole region. For example SWRDA states that: We are responsible for providing regional economic leadership. Our activities focus on gathering and sharing the best intelligence for the benefit of everyone in the region. http://www.southwestrda.org.uk Therefore it could be argued that there is two dominant and competing narratives in regards the border of South West England. A narrative of Cornish nationhood that asserts that the border is the River Tamar which separates the Celtic nation from the English nation, and the narrative of the South West Region that sets its (regional) border somewhere between the Westcountry and the rest of Southern England. But is the construction of spatial identity as unequivocal as both these narratives would suggest? As will be discussed, there exist many borders within Cornwall and Devon, and a number of conflicting narratives concerning spatial ethnicity. The National Vs the Ethnic Border JW: Well the established border now is the Tamar... KM: Do you think that's correct? JW: Yeah, I'm happy to go along with that—that was set by Athelstan in 936 as the border between Saxonia and Cornubia. [... ] and it's still the border today in a legal sense. KM: What about in an ethnic sense? JW: Ah well that's always changing. I mean, people say ah well Cornwall at one time was the River Parrot in Somerset, and then it was the river in Exeter. That's true—because with the Saxons coming in it took them about five hundred years to go from Kent all the way down [... ] to what is now the River Tamar. So if you like, the border would have been blurred because of pockets of different groups mingling here, there and everything. But the border in a cultural and ethnic sense would have always been retreating over those centuries. And then it got the Tamar and that was set as the border, but in an ethnic sense that may not have been the border then, it was just convenient for him to choose that huge river as a dividing line. [... ] The Tamar is recognised now as being the county border, that's why it's retained in the memory now as county border, when in actual fact it's a long standing border between England and Cornwall. That has been reflected in many documents down through the ages... .These are historic relations between this constitutional entity and that constitutional entity that have come through time and are still reflected in legislation today. (Interview of 'JW', CAVA, August 2003) This is an excerpt from an interview recorded between myself (KM) and 'JW', an author and Cornish rights campaigner. Within this piece of narrative we can see how JW constructs his mental border through elements originating from the discourse of Cornish nationalism. Athelstan's designation of the River Tamar as the border between Cornwall and England is again central to JW's 'justification' of this 'national' border. For JW the Tamar is a legal border that separates two different constitutional entities. Further on in the interview JW asserts that the fact that the Tamar is still a constitutional border is proven by such instances at the 1998 Tamar Bridge Act, whereby the Duke of Cornwall and the Queen of England were 'treated as equals', and neither party could impinge on the other's constitutional rights within their 'territories'. This echoes the discourse of the Kilbrandon Commission of 1973, that highlighted the constitutional rights and distinctiveness awarded to Cornwall by its status as a Duchy. The Kilbrandon

Report was written at the time when the devolution issue within the United Kingdom was receiving a considerable amount of debate. Although the report advocated greater use of the title 'Duchy of Cornwall' to emphasise Cornwall's constitutional status and to acknowledge Cornwall as a separate territorial region, it did not recommend devolution for the Duchy (Payton 1993, 242-3). But it could be argued that the remnants of the discourse revolving around the Kilbrandon period continues to, in part, influence JW's narrative; whereby focusing on the legal and constitutional history of the Duchy helps him compose a history of two separate nations divided by the 'enduring border' of the River Tamar. The discourse between JW and me also reveals my own difficulty in perceiving the Tamar as an ethnic border. As mentioned, classing myself as a Cornish-Devonian, having family heritage on both sides of the river, leads me to challenge JW in his polarisation between the Cornish and English on either side of the border. JW does concede that the border may well have been 'blurred' in an ethnic sense, but focuses on the Tamar as a constitutional border as this provides a more effective justification of Cornwall's distinctiveness from England. Indeed, it perhaps is just as awkward for him to imagine kinship links across the Tamar as it is for me to think of the river as an explicit divide between two ethnicities. The issue of a shared Celtic ethnicity between the Cornish and the Devonians has recently become a controversial subject with the emergence of the Devon Movement. So far the Devon Movement has been ostensibly a cultural rather than an political phenomenon; for example in 2002 during a BBC Radio Devon debate about the county's sense of identity a Devon flag was created, but thus far the flag has not been coerced into any political movement. However, perhaps not surprisingly the Devon Movement has outraged many Cornish nationalists, who as expressed by JW, are angry that Devon appears to be mimicking Cornish identity and fear for the impact this could have on Cornwall's Celtic 'distinctiveness'. When asked for his opinion about the Devon Movement JW replied: [Groans]... Uh not very happy, not very happy at all, because Cornwall has got to show that it's distinctive in order to get any benefits from being distinctive. So if you've got a group of people... who are conjuring up a fictitious history and image for a region of England and modelling that on Cornwall's distinctiveness than that is inevitably going to detract from our distinctiveness. (Interview of 'JW', CAVA, August 2003) A completely different perspective to JW's of where the border between Celtic and Saxon exists was expressed in an interview of 'KP', who has been highly influential in the Devon Movement: I was aware of the fact that there was this element in Devon that were part of the tribe of the Dumnonii... it was certainly a much larger tribe than Cornwall and before the recognised time of Cornwall... .The Tamar is a nice and easy devisable line for people with nice and easy devisable minds, but nothing in the world is like that, your might get a high density of something, but you also get the peripheries. (Interview of 'KP', CAVA, August 2006) In his exploration of 'the past in French history', Robert Gildea argues that there is no single French collective memory, rather "parallel and competing collective memories elaborated by communities which have experienced and handle the past in different ways" (Gildea 1994, 10). Similarly, there is no unified collective memory in the far South West peninsula and the nature of the historical relationship between Cornwall and Devon can be a contentious issue. A number of polemical letters between Cornish nationalists and Devon Movement supporters have been published in the local press. Supporters of the Devon Movement have drawn attention to the ancient bloodlines and historic (Celtic) ties between Devon and Cornwall, as well as the survival of the Cornish language in parts of west Devon

into at least the fourteenth century. Cornish nationalists have retorted against such claims, and have asserted that Devon was 'ethnically cleansed' of the Cornish people by the Anglo-Saxon invasions in the tenth century, whereby the Cornish settled to the west of the Tamar. All borders, to a certain extent, are historical constructions. Both quotes from JW and KP demonstrate the importance of history in legitimising borders, and how different versions of history compete to dictate where the border lies. For JW, focusing on Athelstan's establishment of the Tamar as the constitutional border between Cornwall and England in 936 as a key event in history helps to 'justify' the legitimacy of a separate Cornish Nation, and overrides the legitimacy of any remnants of ethnic ties that may exist across the Tamar. Whereas, KP (and many others in the Devon Movement) choose to revive the memory of the earlier period of the Dumnonii, a Celtic 'tribe' that inhabited much of the South West peninsula covering present day Cornwall, Devon and parts of southern Somerset. Nonetheless, it is thought that the Kingdom of Dumnonia was not politically centralised and consisted of a series of independent tribes that gradually became overrun by the Anglo-Saxons from the seventh century onwards. But for KP the 'remembering' of a united and related Celtic tribe of Dumnonia justifies Devon's right to Celtic ancestry on a level footing with Cornwall's claims of 'distinctiveness'. Often the 'Celtic fringes' of the United Kingdom have been portrayed as the peripheries of the English state, but such evidence taken from oral testimony suggests that there exists a more complex axis of centreperiphery identity at the micro level. For KP the Tamar is neither a national or ethnic border, and although there may be a 'high density' of Celtic ancestry in Cornwall, he also seems to perceive Devon as being part of a periphery to the Celtic fringe of Southern Britain. Indeed, as will now be discussed, Cornwall is by no means a united entity and the Tamar is not the only border that divides people within the South West peninsula. The East vs. West Cornwall Border So far we have considered the parallel and competing images of the Tamar as a national and a county border, but there is another border in existence within Cornwall. It is a far more intangible border but no less real, and runs somewhere from the east of Bodmin and St Austell, separating 'East' from 'West' Cornwall. It is a well known local adage that 'you're not really Cornish if you were born east of St Austell'; an opinion that often causes people in the east of the county to feel a sense of exclusion from the rest of Cornwall. Paradoxically, despite the Tamar being portrayed as an ethno-nationalist border polarising the Cornish from the English, at the same time, there appears to exist varying levels of 'Cornishness' that differentiates the border peripheries from the real Cornwall/Cornish further west. This mental border between East and West Cornwall emerged in an interview with 'AB' from Saltash: My father's family have been here for a very, very long time. Part of my mother's family also came from Saltash....I've always lived in Saltash, I'm very proud of my Cornish roots, and when people try to say 'oh because you were born in Plymouth'. I mean, I was only in there a couple of days, and then brought back to Saltash, so I know no different than Saltash, and I've got all this Cornish blood running through me, and then someone tries to tell you that you're not Cornish. [... ] If you go and talk to somebody from west Cornwall they think... well I don't know what they class this area as, they think Cornwall starts down around Bodmin, which is something else that annoys me, because they're eroding their own county. You know, Cornwall starts at the Tamar and it has done since about nine hundred and something... . They think we're part of Plymouth or something... they know that the Tamar is the start of Cornwall but to them Cornwall is down west. (Interview of 'AB', CAVA, April 2006) Arguably Saltash is now the principal 'frontier town' in Cornwall, as the majority of road and rail traffic passes through it. Its close proximity to Plymouth, being

linked to the English city across the Tamar by two bridges, seems to cultivate a powerful vindication of Cornish identity in Saltash, which is reflected in the 'emblems' of Cornish identity located around the town. Cornish flags are flown proudly from buildings on the Saltash waterfront on the banks of the Tamar and the town's railway station has recently had the addition of two bi-lingual signs that welcomes visitors to Cornwall in both English and Cornish. Bi-lingual sign at Saltash Railway Station The perceived threat from Plymouth in regards to economic and migration issues appears to reinforce the need to retain the 'Cornishness' of the town to avoid it being sucked into a 'Plymouth suburb'. Indeed, in recent years Saltash has expanded considerably due to a large amount of new housing developments, which is arguably due to people wanting to 'move across to Cornwall' from Plymouth, while still having the convenience of being close to the city. There is also much grievance from Saltash and South East Cornwall people regarding the necessity to rely on Plymouth for health care. The major contention being that the maternity care for South East Cornwall is provided by Derriford Hospital (and before that Freedom Fields Hospital) in Plymouth; this has meant that most mothers living in this area have to give birth away from Cornish territory. AB was one of those Cornish babies born in Plymouth; within the interview he had a very heated debate with 'MT' (another interviewee) over the issue of place of birth and ethnicity. MT asserted that you have to be born on the Cornish side of the Tamar to be really Cornish, and criticised Cornish mothers for relying on Derriford Hospital as they could give birth at home. AB retorted that some mothers have complications which mean that they would be unable to take this option. He also asserted (as in his own case), that many individuals have 'Cornish blood running through them', and the place of birth does not detract from someone's ethnicity. The point is, here we have two opposing versions of the meaning of Cornish ethnicity and the mental borders that define ethnicity either set along the lines of spatial territory or genetic heritage. For AB the Tamar is still very much the border between Cornwall and England, but the concentration of his Cornish family heritage enable him to override his place of birth and defend his sense of Cornish ethnicity. Nonetheless despite a powerful feeling of Cornish defence at such frontier towns as Saltash, and the Tamar being perceived as the ethnic border between Cornwall and England, the mental map of Cornwall is not as simple as this would suggest. Many residents of East Cornwall perceive themselves as living in the periphery of West Cornwall, which possesses the majority of the Duchy's infrastructure and, of course, its capital Truro. Up until now the concentration, at least in academic discourse, has been on a 'centre-periphery model', that focuses upon Cornwall (as a whole) being a distinct periphery—yet dominated by the English centre (Refer to Payton 1992, Lee 1993, 253-69). But insights revealed by oral testimony suggest that at the micro level there prevails what could be termed as a 'reverseperiphery model' between the West Cornwall 'centre' and the East Cornwall 'periphery'. More research is required into what extent East Cornwall is marginalised in socio-economic terms, but in terms of cultural memory certainly the perception of exclusion and difference from the other side of the West-East mental border continues to split Cornwall into two conflicting territories. AB's narrative not only reveals the emotional tensions between East and West Cornwall but also the dichotomy created by the perceptions of what constitutes 'Cornwall'. AB comments that 'to them Cornwall is down west', and indeed for many people Cornwall's image is made up of such 'Cornish things' as mine engine houses, fishing villages, rugged cliff tops, Celtic Crosses and Holy Wells that create a sense of 'remote romanticism', which is associated with the west of the periphery and not the 'softer' landscape of East Cornwall. Ironically, East Cornwall does have a rich industrial heritage connected to Cornish mining and fishing, as it

does Celtic remnants and such romanticised images of Cornwall are largely the result of externally generated images created by artist colonies and the tourist and media industries (Refer to Howlett 2004). Yet, for many individuals this mental border serves as a bastion to protect again the 'other' and differentiate 'real' Celtic West Cornwall from East Cornwall, which to some is apparently considered to be 'contaminated' by Plymouth or England. AB's extract also reveals how competing spatial identities can co-exist within one person. Anderson and O'Dowd have similarly pointed out that contradictory images of borders can co-exist concurrently in the same people, as many individuals have to regularly deal with not one state but two (Anderson and O'Dowd 1999(a), 595-6). Although the Tamar is not an 'official' state border, it nonetheless denotes a multiplicity of spatial identities that alternate between it being a country or a county border. For the people of East Cornwall this is especially complex, as they may well feel separate from England, yet are often still reliant on the other side of the border for employment and various services. AB says that those in West Cornwall are 'eroding their own county'—and the key word here is 'county'. Although, as discussed, AB feels very strongly Cornish and sees the Tamar as an ethnic border established since the tenth century, he nonetheless still appears to perceive Cornwall as a county not a country. AB's construction of Cornwall's spatial perimeters comprises of linguistic elements stemming from both conflicting grand narratives that were discussed previously, namely: Cornwall the Celtic nation, and Cornwall the English county. For AB the Tamar alternates from being an ethno-national border and an English county border, articulating a sense of both separateness and unity across the river. Conclusion It would seem for now that the two dominant (or at least articulated) narratives regarding the Cornwall-Devon border, revolves around the Tamar existing as an English county or a Celtic nation border. This creates a curious paradoxical tension between two competing levels of consciousness: between Cornwall being something separate and different from England, yet at the same time being incorporated across the Tamar as Cornwall is still 'officially' classed as a English county. But as we have seen, the situation is even more complex than the country-county model would suggest. There is more than one border that divides or unites Cornwall and Devon/England. Individuals are exposed to a plethora of images and discourses which map out a number of borders within Cornwall and Devon and the larger 'South West'. These competing borders can co-exist within one individual and shift according to time and place. Perhaps the conflict of internal borders are especially relevant to those in the Tamar borderlands, as they have to negotiate their lives 'at the borders' on a daily basis and try to comprehend on which side (if any) of the border they belong. Certainly within my own struggle to negotiate my dual Cornish-Devonian identity, my own mental border can shift depending on whether I am at home (in Devon), or at work (in Cornwall) and what people and discourses I am surrounding by. In sum, I would argue that more consideration needs to be given to the diversity and plurality of borders that exist not only in Cornwall and Devon, but in the wider Celtic 'world'. An analytical approach to spatial identity is essential in Celtic Studies in order to fully appreciate both the physical and mental complexities of Celtic borders. References Agger, Ben, 1991, A Critical Theory of Public Life: Knowledge, Discourse and Politics in an Age of Decline, The Falmer Press, London. Anderson, Benedict, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, (Revised Edition), 1991, Verso, London, New York. Anderson, James and O'Dowd, Liam, 1999(a), 'Border Regions and Territoriality:

Contradictory Meanings, Changing Significance', Regional Studies, Vol. 33.7. Anderson, James and O'Dowd, Liam, 1999(b), 'Contested Borders: Globalization and Ethno-National Conflict in Ireland', Regional Studies, Vol. 33.7. Burton, Rob, 1997, A Passion to Exist: Cultural Hegemony and the Roots of Cornish Identity, in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornish Studies Five, University of Exeter Press, Exeter. Cohen, Anthony P. (ed.), 1986, Symbolising Boundaries: Identity and Diversity in British Cultures, Manchester. Cohen, Anthony P., 1992, The Symbolic Construction of Community, Routledge, London. Deacon, Bernard, 2000, 'In Search of the Missing "Turn": The Spatial Dimension and Cornish Studies', in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornish Studies: Eight, Exeter. Deacon, Bernard, 2004(a), 'Celtic Frontier or County Boundary? Competing Discourses of a Late Nineteenth Century British Border', paper presented to Crossing Borders: Histories, Theories and Identities conference at the Centre for Border Studies, University of Glamorgan. Deacon, Bernard, 2004(b), 'Producing Regions, rolling out discourses: power and culture in practice', Contemporary Cornwall Seminars, Institute of Cornish Studies, University of Exeter. Donnan, Hastings and Wilson, Thomas M., 2001, Borders: Frontiers of Identity, Nation and State, Berg, Oxford. Gildea, Robert, 1994, The Past in French History, Yale University Press, New Haven. Howlett, Jonathan, 'Putting the Kitsch into Kernow', in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornish Studies Twelve, University of Exeter Press, Exeter, 2004. Lee, Adrian, 1993, 'Political Parties and Elections', in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornwall Since the War, Dyllansow Truran, Redruth. Lewis, Joanna, 2004, Sovereigns, Madams and Double Whites: Fruit and Flower Pioneers of the Tamar Valley, Tamar Valley AONB Service, St. Dominick. Paasi, Anssi, 1999, 'Boundaries as Social Practice and Discourse: the FinishRussian Border', Regional Studies, Vol. 33.7. Payton, Philip, 1992, The Making of Modern Cornwall: Historical Experience and the Persistence of 'Difference', Dyllansow Truran, Reduth. Payton, Philip (ed), 1993, Cornwall Since the War, Dyllansow Truran, Redruth. Portelli, Alessandro, 1997, The Battle of Valle Giulia: Oral History and the Art of Dialogue, of Wisconsin Press, Wisconsin. Tregidga, Garry, 2000, The Liberal Party in South-West Britain Since 1918: Political Decline, Dormancy and Rebirth, University of Exeter Press, Exeter. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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