English or British?

Just to review:
England = one country
Britain = England and Wales
Great Britain = England, Wales and Scotland
United Kingdom (of Great Britain and Northern Ireland) = England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland (Ulster)
British Isles = a disputed term meaning the islands of Ireland and of Great Britain. Because it contains the word 'British', there are other suggestions. Like 'The North Atlantic Isles'.

As a passport holder of both British and Irish citizenship, I'm rather interested in these ideological definitions and how they're thought about culturally. The naming of the British Shakespeare Association was contested as having colonialist/imperialist bias for example.

The England football team sing 'God Save the Queen', as do the Northern Ireland football team, which is the British national anthem. The Scots and the Welsh, meanwhile, sing separate national anthems.

I agree with recent campaigners that England should have a separate national anthem, partly because 'God Save the Queen' is so turgid, and also because it excludes those of us who are Republican. It also has the famous line about crushing the Scots, which is hardly inclusively British!

Which anthem, though? The two main contenders are 'Land of Hope and Glory' and 'Jerusalem'. 'Land of Hope and Glory is all right, although it has some imperialist lines about extending the country's borders ...

Jerusalem has been gathering momentum recently as it figured prominently in England's Ashes victory over the Aussies. Here's what Wikipedia says about it:

And did those feet in ancient time is a poem by William Blake from the preface to his work Milton: a Poem (1804). Today it is best known as the hymn Jerusalem, with music written by C. Hubert H. Parry in 1916, the most famous version of which is an orchestration written by Sir Edward Elgar in 1922.

This is considered to be one of England's most popular patriotic songs, often being used as an alternative anthem. It is variously associated with English nationalism, anti-modernism, post-modernism, socialist ideals, and Christianity, thereby holding a rather odd position. Jerusalem is the official anthem of the British National Party and the British Women's Institute, and historically was used by the National Union of Suffrage Societies.

The text of the poem was inspired by the legend that Jesus, while still a young man, accompanied Joseph of Arimathea to Glastonbury. Blake's biographers tell us that he believed in this legend. However, the poem's theme or subtext is subject to much sharper debate, probably accounting for its popularity across the philosophical spectrum.

One particular line from the poem, "Bring me my chariot of fire", apparently inspired the title of the film Chariots of Fire.

Here's the text of Blake's poem:

And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen?

And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among those dark Satanic mills?

Bring me my bow of burning gold!
Bring me my arrows of desire!
Bring me my spear! O clouds, unfold!
Bring me my chariot of fire!

I will not cease from mental fight
Nor shall my sword sleep in my
hand
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England's green and pleasant
land.

For more on the faultlines between Englishness and Britishness (because people often seem to mean 'quintessentially English' even if they say ''quintessentially British'), see Mark Lawson's article on Nobel prizewinner Harold Pinter and Aardman Animation director Nick Park, in today's Guardian.