Back in 1961 Cornwall and Scilly were home to around 340,000 people. The population then began to rise sharply. By the end of this century on current trends it will be knocking on the door of a million, or 990,000 to be exact. While that’s likely to be the least of our worries if ‘business … Continue reading State of the nation: Population change
Category: contemporary
State of the nation: identity
In 2021 79,941 of Cornwall’s residents went to the trouble of writing ‘Cornish’ in their response to the census question on national identity. Another 9,031 wrote ‘Cornish’ while also checking the tick-box for ‘British’. Together these accounted for 15.6% of residents. This was an increase of about 16,000 on the 13.8% who declared a Cornish … Continue reading State of the nation: identity
State of the Cornish nation: pay
What’s been happening to wages and salaries in Cornwall recently? The gross weekly pay of full-time workers in Cornwall, although still languishing behind that of Britain as a whole, has been catching up since 2021. Time will tell whether this is a post-covid short-term blip or whether it means the long-awaited ‘high-wage economy’ that policy-makers … Continue reading State of the Cornish nation: pay
State of the Cornish nation: jobs
What are the most common jobs for people in Cornwall? First, let’s dispatch a couple of myths. Those icons of Cornwall, the miner and the fisherman, together with the invisible member of the traditional triptych - the farmer and farm labourer - may have accounted for most male jobs in the 19th century. But no … Continue reading State of the Cornish nation: jobs
Population growth and gentrification, marine tourism and a 15th century social climber
Here's the final set of brief summaries providing links to recent reviews of academic literature on Cornwall. You're now (almost) up to speed. In an important article on contemporary Cornwall Joanie Willett shows how population growth and gentrification have failed to solve Cornwall's endemic socio-economic difficulties while exacerbating a growing housing crisis and fragmenting local … Continue reading Population growth and gentrification, marine tourism and a 15th century social climber
Wrestling, life-struggle Cornwall and Daphne du Maurier
Have patience. Just one to go. The penultimate in my series of very short summaries of academic work on Cornwall linked to somewhat longer reviews. Mike Tripp recounts the nineteenth century rise and fall of Cornish wrestling, brought down mainly by emigration, depopulation and the practice of 'faggoting', or match-fixing. Ella Westland argues that in … Continue reading Wrestling, life-struggle Cornwall and Daphne du Maurier
Heraldry and medieval identity, the 1549 rising and choughs
Save yourself all the bother of having to read them - here's the fifth instalment of very short summaries of some recent academic takes on Cornwall ... Nigel Saul ascribes the Carminow family's myth about their coat of arms to the family's sixteenth century decline while going on to claim the Cornish identity was by … Continue reading Heraldry and medieval identity, the 1549 rising and choughs
The steam engine, more on Gothic Cornwall and the Cornish dialect
The fourth in my series of one sentence (sometimes two) summaries of recent academic work on Cornwall ... Mary O'Sullivan follows the money and tells us why the miners who were demonstrating in 1787 had a better grasp of economics than some mines adventurers of the time. Joan Passey is attracted by the 'Cornish Gothic' … Continue reading The steam engine, more on Gothic Cornwall and the Cornish dialect
Gothic Cornwall, daffodil pickers and mining heritage
Impress your friends with your wide knowledge of recent academic work on Cornwall ... Tanya Krzywinska and Ruth Heholt claim that Cornwall has inspired Gothic novelists and explain the composition of 'Gothic Cornwall', simultaneously exciting and disturbing, attractive yet terrifying. Constantine Manolchev presents the narrative of a daffodil picker from Bulgaria working on a Cornish … Continue reading Gothic Cornwall, daffodil pickers and mining heritage
St Minver: Second homes and servants
Walking through the coastal communities of St Minver on the Camel estuary in the dead of night in winter can be unnerving. The place is eerily quiet, not a light to be seen in the empty houses staring out to sea. The parish now exists in a curious limbo – in Cornwall but eerily not … Continue reading St Minver: Second homes and servants
Cornish studies resources 