The EU Referendum of 2016 was one of the most significant events in recent British political history. It is widely recognised that citizens engaged with the referendum through understandings of Britain, the EU, the world, and their place in it. This study complements existing research where such understandings have been inferred from citizens’ demographic characteristics, the characteristics of their localities/regions, or elite discourses. It builds on existing research where a more direct engagement with citizens’ understandings has been achieved through interviews or focus groups, allowing the content of understandings to be thickly described. To these latter studies, this paper makes three main contributions. First, it focuses on popular imaginative geographies, which are conceptualised drawing on literatures in Geography and Political Science as fast-thinking heuristics. Second, it brings new evidence to the conversation in the form of volunteer writing for Mass Observation. Third, the focus is on the content of popular imaginative geographies, but also how and why such geographies were used by voters in the referendum. The main findings include that many Leave supporters imagined Britain as an island – either a once great military and imperial power, an island separate from Europe, needing freedom from Europe to engage in the wider world; or a small island, a full container, close to the rest of Europe and vulnerable to mobilities across Europe’s borders. By contrast, many Remain supporters imagined Britain as post-imperial, small, vulnerable, and under threat of isolation from Europe and exposure to a chaotic, uncertain, dangerous world. Both groups engaged with the referendum through such popular imaginative geographies because the referendum presented voters with a difficult task, the campaigns provided few trustworthy facts, and voters therefore had to rely on cognitive shortcuts, including popular imaginative geographies.

中文翻译：

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流行的富有想象力的地理和英国脱欧：来自大众观察的证据

2016 年的欧盟公投是英国近代政治史上最重要的事件之一。人们普遍认为，公民通过对英国、欧盟、世界及其在其中的地位的理解来参与公投。本研究补充了现有的研究，这些研究是从公民的人口特征、地方/地区的特征或精英话语中推断出来的。它建立在现有研究的基础上，通过访谈或焦点小组实现了对公民理解的更直接参与，从而对理解的内容进行了详细描述。对于后面的这些研究，本文做出了三个主要贡献。首先，它专注于流行的富有想象力的地理区域，这些概念化了地理学和政治学文献作为快速思维的启发式方法。其次，它以大众观察志愿者写作的形式为对话带来了新的证据。第三，重点是流行的想象地理的内容，以及选民在公投中如何以及为什么使用这些地理。主要发现包括，许多脱欧支持者将英国想象成一个岛屿——要么是一个曾经强大的军事和帝国力量，一个与欧洲分离的岛屿，需要脱离欧洲的自由才能参与更广阔的世界；或者一个小岛，一个满载集装箱，靠近欧洲其他地区，容易受到跨越欧洲边界的流动的影响。相比之下，许多留欧支持者将英国想象成后帝国时代、小国、脆弱、并面临与欧洲孤立的威胁，并暴露在一个混乱、不确定、危险的世界中。两个群体都通过如此受欢迎的想象地理参与公投，因为公投给选民带来了一项艰巨的任务，竞选活动提供的可信事实很少，因此选民不得不依赖认知捷径，包括流行的想象地理。