A Modern, Thriving Society

This chapter covers culture, religion, sport and the arts. It is the most enjoyable to read but it is also where the exam can ask very specific questions — the exact year a festival was founded, the patron saint of a country, the name of an artist or composer. Treat each section as a checklist of names and dates to recognise.

Religion and festivals

Christianity is the largest religion in the UK, with the Church of England being the established church (the monarch is its head and the Archbishop of Canterbury its leader). Other significant communities include Muslim, Hindu, Sikh, Jewish and Buddhist. Major festivals include Christmas (25 December), Easter, Eid ul-Fitr, Eid ul-Adha, Diwali, Hannukah and Vaisakhi. Distinctively British public events include Bonfire Night (5 November), Remembrance Day (11 November) and the Edinburgh Fringe.

The arts and literature

Britain has produced some of the world's most influential writers — William Shakespeare, the Brontë sisters, Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy, J. K. Rowling and many more. Notable poets include William Wordsworth, Robert Burns (Scotland), Dylan Thomas (Wales) and Wilfred Owen. The Turner Prize was established in 1984 to celebrate contemporary art. Famous British painters include Constable, Turner, Gainsborough, Hockney and Lucian Freud.

Further reading: an in-depth editorial guide that expands on this section with worked examples and historical context.

Music, theatre and film

Classical composers include Henry Purcell, Edward Elgar, Ralph Vaughan Williams and Benjamin Britten. The UK is home to the BBC Proms, the world's largest classical music festival. The Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin and Queen are among the bands that defined modern popular music. British film directors include Sir Alfred Hitchcock, David Lean, Sir Ridley Scott and Christopher Nolan. The Edinburgh International Festival and the Royal Shakespeare Company are leading institutions in theatre.

Sport

Football, rugby, cricket, tennis, golf, horse racing and motor sports all have deep British roots. Wimbledon is the oldest tennis tournament in the world, dating from 1877. The Grand National is the most famous horse race. The UK hosted the Olympic Games in 1908, 1948 and 2012, and the 2012 Paralympic Games are widely credited with transforming public attitudes to disability sport. The Six Nations rugby championship is contested by England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland, France and Italy.

Related reference: an external resource we recommend for candidates who want to dig deeper into the official source material.

Science, invention and discovery

The UK has won more Nobel Prizes than any other country except the United States. Sir Isaac Newton (gravity, calculus), Charles Darwin (theory of evolution), Alexander Fleming (penicillin), Sir Tim Berners-Lee (the World Wide Web) and Stephen Hawking are all examples. Scottish inventor Alexander Graham Bell is credited with patenting the first practical telephone. The hovercraft, the jet engine and the structure of DNA are all British scientific milestones you may be asked about.

Leisure, food and tourism

British cuisine includes regional dishes such as the Sunday roast (England), haggis (Scotland), Welsh cakes (Wales) and the Ulster fry (Northern Ireland). Pubs and gardening are quintessentially British leisure pursuits. Major tourist sites include the Tower of London, Edinburgh Castle, Stonehenge, the Lake District, the Eden Project in Cornwall and the Giant's Causeway in Northern Ireland.

Test yourself on this chapter

Below are five practice tests built exclusively from A Modern, Thriving Society. Each test contains 25 questions in the same multiple-choice format used in the official Life in the UK exam, with a written explanation under every answer.