O'bama? It could never happen in England

"My name is Barack Obama, of the Moneygall Obamas, and I've come home to find the apostrophe we lost somewhere along the way," joked the US president when he visited Ireland en route to the UK last month. Like John F Kennedy and Ronald Reagan before him, Obama was just another US president embracing his Celtic heritage. And the practice isn't just for those looking for a vote-winner: Yankees have always loved to talk up their Irish blood – and Scottish, too. But Americans celebrating their Englishness? That's not quite so common.

Now a group of academics want to find out why. Donald MacRaild, professor of history at Northumbria University in Newcastle, and his colleagues Tanja Bueltmann and David Gleeson, reckon English cultural communities did exist in North America, but have been ignored by traditional historians.

The academics believe the commonly accepted truth – that the English assimilated into Anglo-American culture without any need to shout about their separate ethnicity – just isn't true. And they're now embarking on a three-year project to prove their case. The study – called Locating the Hidden Diaspora: The English in North America in Transatlantic Perspective – focuses on the years between 1760 and 1950 to find out where history lost sight of Englishness in America.

"The English," says MacRaild, "have had very little exposure to the historian's gaze, and we want to rectify that. Back in the 1730s, the English in North America formed an array of ethnic clubs and societies, like the St George's Society, in the same way that their Irish and Scottish peers had St Patrick's societies, Caledonian societies and St Andrew's societies. They provided charity – from meal tickets to Christmas gifts – to poorer English immigrants, and celebrated English events. But since then, no one has shown much interest in the English cultural legacy. Whilst the Irish, Scots, Germans, and many other European ethnic groups have been subjected to dozens, if not hundreds, of studies, it hasn't been so for the English."

The Arts and Humanities Research Council clearly agreed with MacRaild's point. The distributor of state cash for academic research has gifted the Northumbria trio £286,000 to re-examine English ethnicity using thousands of untapped sources, including manuscripts, photos, newspaper articles and books. The trio will also look at contemporary traces of Englishness in the US. "A huge number of American traditions come from England," says MacRaild. "We took tiddlywinks to America as well as cricket, association football and the annual Easter egg-rolling tradition at the White House."

Other evidence of Englishness have been spotted in reports of immigrants to the US celebrating St George's Day, toasting Queen Victoria, marking Shakespeare's birthday and Morris dancing. "So much that is English is liked in America, from the way universities work, to a love of English culture and history and a belief in the fundamentals of individualism and democracy," MacRaild adds. "What Americans don't do today is to simply see themselves as an extension of England. That began to die quite quickly after the American Revolution of the 1770s and 1780s."

As the founding colonists, the English were the benchmark against which other ethnic groups measured themselves, the academics have found thus far. "Whilst the Irish saw themselves as a victim diaspora, they saw the English as central to their victimisation. We also have lots of evidence of conflict between the English and Americans over dual allegiances to Uncle Sam and Queen Victoria. In many towns, there was significant conflict between the Irish and the English as they extended their homeland disagreements into the new world."

Previously under-examined manuscripts are throwing new light on centuries of US politics and nationalism, MacRaild reports. He is currently analysing an article in The Republic: A Monthly Magazine of American Literature, Politics & Art from June 1852, which expressed anger that the English in New York were swearing allegiance to the monarch of England. "The magazine's editor accepted that the British consul had every right to 'reiterate their loyalty and subjection to her most excellent Majesty, even to the kissing of her most excellent Majesty's little toe-nail'," says MacRaild. "But that wasn't acceptable for immigrants who, becoming American citizens, had 'solemnly abjured and renounced' Victoria. There were clearly divisions. Nowadays the English are dubbed 'invisible immigrants'. That plainly isn't true."

The Northumbria academics believe that a central reason for the lack of interest in English nationalism abroad was confusion about its status at home. "The apparent absence of a sense of an English diaspora derives partly from the weak and bitty nature of Englishness at home," says MacRaild. "Contemporary English identity, under pressure in a dissolving United Kingdom, drifts between tub-thumping populism and teary-eyed public spectacle. English people experience cultural cringe against anything which separates Englishness from Britishness." The professor points out that the 2001 UK census added the ethnic category Irish, but not English, while in Scotland, Scottish and Irish were identified as ethnic categories alongside British, but English was absent.

The next stage of the Englishness project is to connect the findings to the present day. The researchers are working on books, an exhibition and a series of public lectures to expatriate community groups throughout North America. They also intend to work with local folk groups in the UK to spread the news about the English in America, and hope that English-Americans will make a "homecoming event" like that set up by the Scottish government in 2009 to lure ex-pats back to the land of their ancestors. "Englishness in England is bedevilled with fears about rightwing, nationalist politicians and football hooligans," says MacRaild. "We hope that demonstrating the vibrancy of Englishness beyond England's shores will contribute to debates about how Englishness fits into today's multi-ethnic and increasingly federal political culture."