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Jingoism: A word for our time?
I'm really really surprised this word, which describes the extreme nationalism and militarism which drove the European colonial expansion in the late nineteenth century, ending in the tragic slaughter of World War I, is making a comeback.
One would have thought the carnage of the 20th century would have put the sentiment to bed permanently, at least in Western countries. It did for a long time. The word used to be an insult but in some quarters it seems now quite okay to be jingoistic.
Here is the Cambridge Dictionary definition:
jingoism
noun [U]
the extreme belief that your own country is always best, which is often shown in enthusiastic support for a war against another country
Patriotism can turn into jingoism and intolerance very quickly.
jingoist
noun [C]
He was a confirmed jingoist and would frequently speak about the dangers of Britain forming closer ties with the rest of Europe.
jingoistic
adjective
In wartime, newspapers tend to become jingoistic.
There were great celebrations and plenty of jingoistic flag-waving when the first troops returned from the war.
The term Jingoism came into use after a music-hall song by G. W. Hunt became popular. The song appeared in music halls at the time of the Russo-Turkish War (1877-8), when anti-Russian feeling ran high in Britain and Disraeli (the British Prime Minister of the day) ordered the Mediterranean fleet to Constantinople. The Russophobes became known as Jingoes, and any belligerent patriotism has been labelled jingoism ever since. Here is the relevant verse of Hunt's music hall song:
We don't want to fight,
But by Jingo if we do,
We've got the ships,
We've got the men,
And got the money too.
We've fought the Bear before,
And while we're Britons true,
The Russians shall not have Constantinople.
As I mentioned earlier jingoism reached its height before World War I - particularly during the Boer and Zulu Wars in Britain's case. The sentiment was completely discredited in the popular imagination by World War I. The public, in their grief at war losses, turned on those who enthusiastically sent young men to their death by the million. Those who were seen to have glorified war came to be known after the war in Britain as "Colonel Blimps", best skewered by Siegfried Sassoon, a war hero, in his 1918 poem "Base Details":
Base Details
If I were fierce, and bald, and short of breath,
I’d live with scarlet Majors at the Base,
And speed glum heroes up the line to death.
You’d see me with my puffy petulant face,
Guzzling and gulping in the best hotel, 5
Reading the Roll of Honour. ‘Poor young chap,’
I’d say—‘I used to know his father well;
Yes, we’ve lost heavily in this last scrap.’
And when the war is done and youth stone dead,
I’d toddle safely home and die—in bed. 10
It was a grave insult to be called a Blimp after World War I.
One would have thought the carnage of the 20th century would have put the sentiment to bed permanently, at least in Western countries. It did for a long time. The word used to be an insult but in some quarters it seems now quite okay to be jingoistic.
Here is the Cambridge Dictionary definition:
jingoism
noun [U]
the extreme belief that your own country is always best, which is often shown in enthusiastic support for a war against another country
Patriotism can turn into jingoism and intolerance very quickly.
jingoist
noun [C]
He was a confirmed jingoist and would frequently speak about the dangers of Britain forming closer ties with the rest of Europe.
jingoistic
adjective
In wartime, newspapers tend to become jingoistic.
There were great celebrations and plenty of jingoistic flag-waving when the first troops returned from the war.
We don't want to fight,
But by Jingo if we do,
We've got the ships,
We've got the men,
And got the money too.
We've fought the Bear before,
And while we're Britons true,
The Russians shall not have Constantinople.
Base Details
If I were fierce, and bald, and short of breath,
I’d live with scarlet Majors at the Base,
And speed glum heroes up the line to death.
You’d see me with my puffy petulant face,
Guzzling and gulping in the best hotel, 5
Reading the Roll of Honour. ‘Poor young chap,’
I’d say—‘I used to know his father well;
Yes, we’ve lost heavily in this last scrap.’
And when the war is done and youth stone dead,
I’d toddle safely home and die—in bed. 10
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