Bradford City versus Swansea City is not the Wembley League Cup final that anybody expected at the start of the football season, with supporters of both clubs looking forward to their first major Wembley final. Days before British Future holds a debate in Bradford, Sunder Katwala asks residents of the city, including season ticket holders, an imam, and the curator of the club museum, what they think about the final and its impact on the city.

There are many things people think of when they hear the name Wales. Mountains, singing, sheep, leeks, harps and, of course, rugby. I myself am from Wales and I definitely see rugby as somehow particularly Welsh. But is this merely a stereotypical view of this little country or are there some intrinsic elements of national pride and identity locked inside the sport? writes Bryn Lewis.

As part of our British Histories series, British Future asked actor Harman Singh and political assistant Mario Creatura what it means to be British and which forces have influenced their identities.

An exhibition at the National Maritime Museum on the East India Company is just as much about our past as it is our present, and just as much about Britain as about Asia. After all, things that we regard as quintessentially British were not always, like the curry and the cup of tea, writes Jemimah Steinfeld.

Does being Jewish mean I should take offence towards the alleged antisemitism in Gerald Scarfe’s recent cartoon, which features Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu paving a wall with the blood and limbs of Palestinians? Not necessarily, writes Jemimah Steinfeld.

The referendum on Scottish independence will be a major political event in the UK in 2014. Yet the relationships and bonds between people from different parts of the UK are unlikely to be hugely affected, writes Mark Diffley.

The bigger picture suggests the Monarchy ended 2012 more secure than ever. Even when things went wrong, as the Thames river pageant turned into a grey and cold test of endurance in the driving rain, it was the BBC which seemed to cop the flak. The Queen’s surprise Olympic contribution to a James Bond stunt helped to seal Danny Boyle’s great fusion of the traditional and the modern in the Olympic opening ceremony, writes Sunder Katwala.

The spirit of 2012 challenged the core instincts of both left and right, argues Sunder Katwala. But will that optimistic sense of what is distinctive about Britain survive into 2013?

Britons from ethnic minority backgrounds are most likely to say that race should not be a factor in finding adoptive parents for children in care, new polling shows.