'A Welshman coming to London and seeing a Jackanapes...': how jokes and slang differentiated eighteenth-century Londoners from the rest of Britain

This article examines the effect of large-scale immigration into London throughout the eighteenth-century, mostly from the English provinces, Wales, Ireland and Scotland. As the city expanded and united into a single geographical identity, an identity of ‘Londoner’ grew with it. It is argued that shared humour expressed through jokes and slang, largely directed at newcomers and non-Londoners, helped to build the idea of the Londoner. Many of those who indulged in this humour were recent immigrants to the city themselves, who used it to assert their status as embedded Londoners. Disparaging jokes and language about the inhabitants of different regions and nations of the Kingdom outside London often came from those who originated from the same areas, and were an important component of identity as a London citizen. In this way inhabitants of London came to see themselves as an in-group against the out-group of the rest of the nation. Key Words: Eighteenth-century, jokes, slang, jest-books, immigration, humour, London-identity, Scotland, Wales, Irelan