{'fraction_non_alphanumeric': 0.028037383177570093, 'fraction_numerical': 0.011502516175413372, 'mean_word_length': 5.052173913043478, 'pattern_counts': {'":': 0, '<': 0, '<?xml version=': 0, '>': 0, 'https://': 0, 'lorem ipsum': 0, 'www.': 0, 'xml': 0}, 'pii_count': 0, 'substrings_counts': 0, 'word_list_counts': {'cursed_substrings.json': 0, 'profanity_word_list.json': 0, 'sexual_word_list.json': 0, 'zh_pornsignals.json': 0}}
Mixing It: Diversity in World War Two Britain by Wendy Webster (review)

Attempting to reshape the well-worn and regularly rehearsed British history of World War Two is a significant challenge, but one that Wendy Webster aims to do with Mixing It. In her own words she sets out to “offer a new way of seeing Britain at war,” to illustrate the diverse demographic resident on British shores between 1939 and 1945, and the significant input it had to the Allied victory. Mixing It also captures the history of British responses to this “multinational” (29) juncture. Webster argues that tolerance of foreigners by the indigenous population was highly variable. It differed between individuals and communities, in public and private, and over the duration of the war. Webster suggests that the degree of variability was influenced by three factors. The speech and language used by visitors to Britain and in British wartime propaganda publicly highlighted a “foreign-ness” that could then be manipulated alternatively to both denigrate and celebrate (16). Adherence to, or flagrance of, what Webster calls “sexual patriotism” was used by people to variably criticise the romantic and sexual behaviour of British women with foreign men (17). The contrasting appearance of foreigners in military uniform and civilian attire also impacted on British reactions to, and interactions with, them (18).