What defines national identity?

This morning I was stopped in the street by a cameraman who wanted to interview me for national television, on the following question: what constitutes national identity for you?

I must explain that we are debating this topic very heavily at the moment. France in the last 40 years has known several waves of immigration from North Africa, Subsaharian Africa, Turkey, and many other regions of the world obviously. We will soon have more practising Muslims than practising Catholics. Some people are afraid that our "national identity" is threatened. A minister even said that he feared that France was now a couscous land, instead of the more acceptable choucroute (which by the way is a German dish, but whatever).

I thought a few seconds about the interview. My mother is a quarter Belgian, a quarter American, a quarter Spanish and a quarter Egyptian. My father is a Scot. I'm French. You can't really say I'm a typical French person, yet I feel entirely French. It's my mother tongue, it's where I was schooled, it's the way I am. I am French. But I don't think that my roots make me any less French than someone whose family has lived here for centuries.

Maybe it's a religious issue. Maybe we are afraid of Islam, because when I told the cameraman that I was the product of immigration myself he shrugged it off:"You're European."

I didn't do the interview. I had too many thoughts to muddle through, and I have too much respect for immigrants to make a half-baked statement in front of the nation.

France for me is a language. I understand that immigrants don't always talk French when they arrive, but I definitely think they should learn it. France is a way of life: we have secular public institutions here, so religion does not play an important part in our lives. You can't wear a cross around your neck, or a headscarf, or anything else in that vein, if you are a public official or a teacher, or even a student, when you are in a place representing the state (aka a town hall or a university). If this makes you unhappy or uncomfortable I don't think you should come to France. Other countries are more open to religious displays.

But I'm still pondering. My sister lives in America, by tradition the land of the Melting Pot. A young country,shaped by immigration. I wonder if America has the same trouble defining what its identity should be. I wonder if people in China, where so many languages are spoken, and over a billion people live, have trouble defining their identity.

And since this week, I am helping to host 50 young students from all of Europe, I have to make a short speech on "being European".

I have no idea yet. But I'm thinking about it.