Art chair torn on independence in her native Scotland

  Wednesday, September 17, 2014 2:00 AM
  News

Pittsburg, KS

Rhona McBain, chair of the Pittsburg State University Department of Art, has lived in several places – Michigan, Texas, Ohio, South Carolina and Kansas.

But no matter where she resides, there is only once place she calls home.

“Scotland is home,” she said. “It always will be.”

McBain, who was born in Scotland, came with her parents to the U.S. when she was between the ages of three and four.

“My dad worked in the auto industry, and jobs in Scotland were scarce,” she said. “Prospects were better over here, so we moved to Detroit. It was only supposed to be for a few years, but we ended up staying.”

Though she’s spent most of her life in the U.S., McBain never became a U.S. citizen and she doesn’t plan to.

“I’m a Scot,” she said. “It’s in my heart. All of my family, except for me and my parents, are in Scotland. I got married in Scotland. I was raised in a Scottish household.

“It’s who I am and it’s who I want to be,” she said.

So, like millions of people in the United Kingdom and around the world, McBain watches with great interest as her native country ponders whether or not to leave the United Kingdom. Scotland is scheduled to vote on independence on Sept. 18.

As to where she stands on the issue, McBain said that, like many in Scotland, she’s torn.

“In our hearts, I think all Scottish people want to be independent,” McBain said. “In our heads, however, we know it’s not that easy. There are challenges that will come along with breaking away from England and the rest of the U.K.”

McBain wonders if Scotland can support itself economically. She wonders how the international community will view and treat an independent Scotland. Will her home country be respected on the world stage?

“There is so much that goes into something like this,” she said. “It’s one thing to be proud and beat the drums for independence, but it’s quite another to live with that decision.”

So while she won’t fully admit she’s pro-independence, she drops enough hints to get a glimpse of her position.

“I’ll say this,” she said. “We have overcome some fairly hard situations in our history. We’ve fought wars after wars, and we have managed to survive. I think we could survive a tough economy.

“If we’re going to do this,” she said, “we should do it now. If we don’t do it now, what are we saying to every kid who dreams about growing up Scottish? When will we get this chance again?”

McBain said she loosely compares Scotland’s desire for independence with the desire American colonists felt in the late 1700s.

“We want to govern ourselves, make decisions that affect Scotland in Scotland,” McBain said. “We want to have our own identity. So, when people here ask me why we want to be independent, I turn around and ask, ‘Why did you?’”