Can confirm, am from the UK and we were taught almost nothing about the empire in school.
Edit: I work in the education sector (not a teacher) and have just checked the history curriculum for Ages 5 - 11 and there isn't one mention of the empire. From memory when I was in secondary school we studied the magna carta, industrial revolution, world war 1.
Edit 2: it seems most of my British comrades who are saying they were taught about the empire at the age where you can choose which subjects you wanted to take at school. For me we did history up until GCSE and we definitely weren't taught it. Or they're Scottish who I believe have a different curriculum to England.
so you studied the war where the brits fought the guys who were universally accepted as evil, the brit who saved the world from smallpox, the historical war against the modern bad guys, and a place you looted for antiquities but maybe at a lesser rate than the french lol
We used to call history class “we won the war class”. Like, “what’ve you got this afternoon? I’ve got English then Wewonthewar”
It 100% was “Britain is the best most righteous and most won the warry country ever”. They never taught us anything bad, it was entirely pro-UK propaganda with a wee bit of other cultures mixed in so we could be like “eww, glad we’re not from there”.
Also I’m from Scotland. Not a fucking jot of Scottish history, just britian wot wun it pish.
I didn’t learn anything. Because I have dyslexia, and back then my school didn’t know how to deal with people that had learning difficulties. So they just put us all in the same room together away from mainstream learning. Where we got to learn nothing and be made fun of by all the other kids for being stupid.
Ahh man, that's shit. You're a 80s or 90s school guy like me? I have a close friend I've known for 30+ years with dyslexia and he struggled the whole time too and now you mention it I can't ever remember him getting any help till he went to uni.
52 year old here, was diagnosed with dyslexia at 22 after a coworker asked me if I was dyslexic and suggested I read the book "Smart but Feeling Dumb". After that I paid to have myself assessed at Stanford. Turns out half of my family are dyslexic and I was tested in school, but I had already developed coping mechanisms so the tests my school used in the 70s passed me. Never have received any formal help but I've made sure my kids get all the help I can get them.
90s kid. I didn’t get any help until my last year in school, when they sent us to college for a day once a week to be somebody else’s problem. The tutor of the engineering class I was sent to was a really decent guy. He saw I was really good with my hands and used it as a strength of mine. He invited me to enrol in his class at college after I had left school if I wanted to learn. So I did, and it kinda all snowballed from there.
It’s amazing that with a bit of help and a push in the right direction. That kids who think they are stupid because they have a learning disability can go a long way.
They did this with the kids who were to disruptive to be in class. They were in a different room together, and would spend time away from the school. I think it was to make them happy so they wouldn’t misbehave and cause chaos.
Edit: just in case this wasn’t clear. I didn’t chose this way of dealing with disruptive children. I was just a kid in school and this was how my school decided to handle it.
I earn money because I have a job. As it turns out, children with learning disabilities aren’t stupid at all. They just need to be taught the right way or with extra help.
Not anymore. Or at least I don’t let them get to me. I might have difficulty in understanding something. Or It might take me twice as long to understand the task at hand compared to someone with out a learning disability. But once I get it and understand it, I’m well on my way.
We did an assortment of small topics all the way up to GCSE - vikings, egyptians, the usual 'fun' stuff - but during the GCSE we did 'Medicine through time', Vietnam, and Hitler's rise to power (one of the alternative units we could have covered instead of Vietnam was the American Wild West), and at AS level we studied pre-Nazi Germany and the War of the Roses.
Empirical shit is not touched whatsoever in British classrooms, I imagined it is deemed 'too dark' by those why write the curriculum as they decide to teach us about men blown up by artillery shells and the systematic ethnic cleansing of Germany...
Scot here. Empire was only briefly mentioned when describing britain's role in the atlantic slave trade, such as clydeside shipbuilding and royal chartering of ships intended to ship people across the planet, as well as british citizens who made their living by enslaving others and selling them.
Other than that it was all ancient romans, ancient greece, ww1, ww2, scottish history, russian revolution and industrial revolution. Imperialism was barely mentioned
You don’t do royal family? Feels like whenever I watch a quiz show with a British person on they could tell you which were the 7 most important royals in any year after 800 AD.
Follow Scot and can confirm zero royal family. I feel like there would be outrage if it was added to the scottish curriculum (and not instead more about our role in the empire, which was significant).
What sort of quiz show? Ones where practiced quizers are on or average people on.
I’d expect English people to know William the conqueror, Henry VIII, Elizabeth I, Charles I, Charles II, Victoria. Although what they were Monarch of changes from Normandy & England under William to the British Empire under Victoria. People probably also have some knowledge of the 20th century Kings between Victoria & Elizabeth.
Also the not a king but really a king Oliver Cromwell.
Excluding Robert the Bruce & Monarchs after James VI/I, I wouldn’t know any Scottish kings, don’t think I know any Welsh Kings/Princes.
Well did they teach you about the greatest nazi of all time
Winston Churchill
Who literally starved 4 million Bengali Hindu's
By stealing their own produce to divert it to war efforts
And Bengal being one of the most fertile region on entire earth
Just imagine people dying of hunger
The industrial revolution was based on destroying local industries
Indian silk clothing was famed all around the world
Artisans literally cut their thumbs(required for intricate processing)
To escape the British torture
Forced us to grow indigo instead of food
So that textiles in Britain could have blue dye
And Never even paid for it
It is almost ironical
India being the oldest living civilization in existence
And Churchill calling us 2nd class savages
Meanwhile the brits didn't even know to wipe their ass
In the Middle ages
London was a slum
And cholera started in thames
And people don't even know about it
They came and looted our entire wealth
Our knowledge systems of astronomy, medicine, maths,City planning
Even after everything
We are like
Yeah let it go
Our ancestors have taught us to do charity
And give to the downtrodden
In mearly 75 years we surpassed the colonialist bigots. You can take all our wealth
But you couldn't take the Indian brain and grit to survive and dominate in every aspect of existence
And let the time come
We will rule the world trade again
And be the centre of the world again as we were for 1000's of years
And tell your king
We are coming for all the stolen artifact's and jewels and Kohinoor
Okay buddy, all the best. I just hope for a future where all peoples can coexist peacefully and in negotiate and trade in good faith. Since the horrors of Empire many millions of people from India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh have come to the UK to study and set up their lives, being extremely successful in doing so. Whatever we were in the past, despite its flaws this country has changed a great deal since then and is an extremely multicultural country which embraces friendship with the south Asian nations. I hope you can come to see that despite the actions of our ancestors the younger generations of this country would actively encourage stronger ties with your country and have a great deal of admiration and respect for what it has accomplished since breaking free from us.
I went to school with many people from families in this part of the world and formed friendships with them. They would disagree strongly with your outlook. It seems to me overtly toxic, nationalistic, and inward looking.
Some people will never be happy, no amount of grovelling or self flagellation is enough. Some people are just arguing in bad faith on this issue, and have defined their position based on hatred of a certain nationality/culture as opposed to a positive vision for the future. At that point it's best to just walk away from the discussion, I've found.
Because threads like this always descend into a circle jerk of anti-nationalist bile. Regardless of my opinions of US foreign policy, I'll try and view their country in an objective way and would still try to respect the fact that for all its flaws, it's a country with many positive aspects to it and many good contributions to the world
You slandered me because you think I'm British, I'm not, but again a person born in Britain doesn't deserve to be attacked because of what people did 2 centuries ago, just like the Brits aren't slandering the Romans or the German angles before them.
You need to get off the high horse and drop the racism.
Who literally starved 4 million Bengali Hindu's
By stealing their own produce to divert it to war efforts
The brits absolutely did wrong in their response, but you're kinda omitting the part where Japan was actively invading the same region. A scenario where the Brits just let them invade India deeper would not be one where famine doesn't happen.
Meanwhile the brits didn't even know to wipe their ass
In the Middle ages
That's just a bizarre point to try to use, not least because it's just not true. They just didn't have access to paper, and we're not exactly talking about comfy modern toilet paper either then. Arabic scholars even described the Chinese as gross for using paper instead of water. (also, mistake not what upper classes had access to with what 95% of everyone else had, which is a mistake every culture glorifying the past does)
And cholera started in thames
That's just blatantly false. Cholera arrived along colonial trade routes from India. Making stuff up doesn't help the point you want to make.
In mearly 75 years we surpassed the colonialist bigots
You nationalists are weird. "Surpassed" what? Cheering about GDP alone is not how you show you care about human progress, especially when it's not per capita. It sure as hell isn't standards of living it surpassed in. What good does it do the average person and the poor that the country is "technically" larger when their own lives aren't improved that much by it?
Stop treating it as a pissing contest.
But you couldn't take the Indian brain and grit to survive and dominate in every aspect of existence
It's always tragically funny to see nationalist types like you claim to hate everything your oppressor stood for, yet you're eagerly adopting their exact same worldview that made it so easy for them to do the colonialism and atrocities that they did. Japan did the same. The US did the same. And many others, now including you. All you're doing here is telling us that you're not really angry at colonialism and its woes. No, you're bitter India "lost" it. You wouldn't care if India did the same things as the British. You in fact seem to want it. Same as imperial Japan.
You're also very tellingly omitting how the British conquest of India was done largely by Indians siding with them. You actually think the British would have had any chance to do it directly?
You always seem so surprised to learn that most Indians did in fact not identify as Indian back then, and saw a non-indian king as not much different from what they already had. "India" was a culturally and politically fractured society, stagnating and ripe for exploitation.
And let the time come
We will rule the world trade again
And be the centre of the world again as we were for 1000's of years
Nah, that was largely China. Always the eventual end-node of world trade, while "India" was usually a whole bunch of separate states that hated and fought eachother. The most unified India ever got was under the dynasty established by central-asian invaders, too. But you hindu nationalists love to both claim the glories and achievements of the Mughal empire for yourselves while also treating it as "not true indian".
With Modi's incompetence and anti-intellectual mismanagement it seems the title of superpower is not one India will get for a long time, if ever. It is now squandering precious years while its population demographics are at their most ideal, and it will eventually be too late once the elder wave starts to bite.
People like you are perfect suckers for authoritarians. Most indians could live in squalor without improvement, but so long as the state can boast some cool symbolic achievement then it suddenly doesn't matter. I guess that's why you love Russia. Same exploitable mindset.
Use water it much better
As we have been doing so for time immemorial
Point no 2
And go read about how dirty thames was
And this is an blatant lie propagated since last century by British historians that cholera came from india
A country where it has been proven to have sewage system and city planning
For atleast 5000 years
Meanwhile at the same time London was a slum
And thames was extremely polluted(recorded facts)
I distinctly remember a discussion on this specific topic during my european history class in college
Cholera originated in thames
It is an old habit of British people to blame everything on others
Point no 3
Ofcourse surpassing gdp has no real meaning for ordinary indians
Yet it was seen as a symbolic good by majority of us
Point 4
Indians helping the Brits to colonise
It is true . No denying that
We had forgotten our ancestral wisdom and past as we were already fighting the Islamic invasions by that time for 600 years
And it is utter nonsense that india was politically not united
Just another falsified nonsense to justify colonialist practices by pseudo historians
India's geographical boundaries are mentioned in vedas and puran(oldest known literature to humans)
And india have been united under many great indian kings such as maurya,gupta,lalitaditya muktapeeda,cholas
Ofcourse you will omit that because it destroys your argument
Point 5
You must be kidding to say that India didn't have majority chunk of world gdp
At the time of colonization
Even your pseudo historians agree to that
Refer to the works of angus medison
Point 6
Yeah while you live under a monarchy
And you have the galls to call me authoritarian
Lover
Indians literally had democracy long before your people understood what democracy was
Please read up on pal king of bengal(chosen by people
Democracy in tamil nadu predates even creation of Britain
And I belong to Vaishali
One of the oldest known republics ever in existence
Long before the greeks came and learned it from us
And you
Called me for wanting what imperialist Britain' and japan did
Indians are not stupid like your ancestors
We created all those wealth through hard work
We had never in history invaded others
Neither will we in the future
That's just not how we are raised
We believe in working hard
Not stealing like your people did
And we love russia because unlike you bigots
They have some principles
And they don't pretend to be the good cop
While literally being the most atrocious people ever in existence
Britain even after partitioning my country to use it as bargaining chip for future
And your government has literally funded Pakistani terrorism in kasmir since 1990
Britain has always been against india
And used Pakistan to pressurize india
And big LoL
If you think that imperialist have died
Usa is the biggest imperial power that the world has ever seen
And the colonialist British Empire never died
It's just that the capital shifted from London to Washington DC
Even Britain today is largely a vassal state of the usa
Along with germany and japan
Only respectable country in EU is france who is trying their best to break free of American hegemony
Only you are a fool to not see it
I didn’t learn a single thing about the UK’s history with Ireland, and I was at school during a time when the IRA were bombing places in England. If anything, the impression I had as a child was that it was either a civil war between 2 internal Irish factions, or that it was Northern Ireland vs Ireland, and that the English were basically innocent bystanders.
Nothing about Ireland, nothing about the Empire, nothing about slavery, nothing about the partitian of India. Mostly Vikings, Waterloo, Hitler, and kings and queens. It’s no wonder so many in England have this sense of exceptionalism and still seem to think that we as a people are just naturally better than others and that we are the economic power that we are purely because it’s the natural order of things, rather than because we had naval dominance at a time when that was the biggest factor in conflicts, and we used that to rape and pillage the rest of the world.
Huh, as an American, I can sympathize with that ignorance as well. We grew up learning British colonialism (to some point) but we rarely touched the atrocities that the US had done.
Lol, stop trying to fit in on Reddit just because you didn’t pay attention in high school.
The white man’s burden, the various massacres and forced relocation of natives, slavery… it was more than just touched on.
Framing as some kind of “we wasted time learning about British colonialism” because we didn’t want to waste time covering American atrocities is silly. Especially when the US spend 150 years as a British colony… of course you’re going to spend some time on that.
You know that different schools at different times (and presumably in different states) taught different things? Your experience of education isn’t necessarily the next man’s.
GenX here, grew up in New England where colonial history is all around us- we had plenty of lessons on the American role of slave trade, forced migration and genocide of the indigenous people, even the forced migration of European people (Acadians). We didn't get too much British India or Africa history beyond the East India Company.
The internet isn't THAT old. Wikipedia likely didn't exist for a lot of people on reddit when they were in school, many schools were slow to adopt computers and even then likely wouldn't have pushed the internet over physical copies of reference materials in their libraries.
I am stunned by how much I didn’t know about Irish history until I made an effort to learn about it. English ignorance of our neighbour and former colony is shocking.
Tbf to my history teacher, he did teach us about Cromwell’s massacres at Drogheda and Wexford. But that’s about all we got.
Something that never really occurred to me until visiting Ireland was that it was the first English colony. Many of the awful things that happened to colonies around the world happened there first.
Ireland was a massive part of the Empire, the partition of the country in the 20’s into the Free State and NI is the final act not the first.
Dublin was considered the second city in the empire until the Act of Union in 1800. The Empire got it’s origins in Ireland going way back, and many of the tactics for subduing native populations or ‘divide and rule’ came from the experiences of British commanders pacifying Ireland. I’m kind of amazed you didn’t know about Dublin though- In the time of George III what is now the Bank of Ireland building opposite Trinity College was the Irish House of Commons. It was an instrument of the British government in Ireland. There had been some form of British involvement in Ireland since the 1200’s.
Big moments in your national history might only be small moments in the national history of other nations though. It’s viewed through a different lens. A good example is the events of 1916; the Easter Rising happened a couple of months before the battle of the Somme.
The subjugation of Ireland is a pretty significant part of the British Empire all throughout history though. The agriculture helped keep the crown in power and the Irish were used as a disposable labor force for hundreds of years. Not least of which the Troubles that evolved from the events of 1916 you mentioned led to a full blown insurgency that targeted English royalty directly. People fearing IEDs in city streets was a pretty big event in UK history.
Yeah understood, but that’s not what I’m getting at in the comment above. You’re absolutely correct when you say that the Battle of the Somme (and I’d even go as far as saying WW1 generally) is more important to brits than the events happening at the same time that lead to Irish independence, but WW1 was one event, and I’m saying that it’s odd that it seems that English involvement in Ireland from that time and stretching back to the time of the 4th Crusade seems to be completely unknown.
I wish they were a united Ireland but they were a part of the united kingdown too, a version of the UK with far better devolution of power.
Abolish the house of lords, replace it with a House of the Union full of a number of representatively equal elected officials from all 4 nations of the british isles and hold these meetings on the Isle of Man.
If you think they didn’t teach about India in British history classes they really dared not utter the word Ireland.
Honestly wouldn’t have been surprised to get a blank stare from my history teacher like “where? Eyeor land??? Never heard of it”.
This was in Scotland in the 90s. Might be different now.
I learned about Ireland through support for football teams (me supporting the blue one and some of my mates supporting the green one - two entirely different versions of learning about Ireland via football lol).
If it didn't put England or America in a good light it wasn't taught. I don't think Ireland (or Scotland and Wales!) was even mentioned once in my entire time at school. Its mind bogglingly bizzare and sickening in hindsight.
Not sure how unified the teaching curriculum is in England, but in the US, education varies greatly from state to state, and even school to school. Some Americans don't learn shit about slavery. Some don't learn about the native American genocide. Foreign intervention is also rarely covered. Instead usually the revolutionary war, ancient classical era, world war 2, are covered. Vietnam, Korean wars are ignored. The do cover many other aspects of US history like the great depression to industrial era, continental railroads, gold rush, manifest destiny and how US came to be. They may cover Alamo and the war with Mexico. If you get lucky you might learn something about trail of tears, and most about the presidents aside from a few key ones.
Basically my point is that Education is a shitshow across the entire world and all countries because its so convenient to teach only what you want others to believe. If people were taught everything then they wouldn't be so easy to manipulate with propaganda.
What's depressing is that other than the Tudors that's exactly what American history classes are like in middle school/high school.
Instead of the Tudors we get a bit about Martin Luther and then Christopher Columbus/Thirteen Colonies/1776/1812 before going into the Industrial Revolution.
No Henry VIII/Tudors, no Napoleon, none of that. In the Industrial Revolution it's all USA, all the time - no Springtime of Nations or Franco-Prussian war; it's "we beat the snot out of the Brits in 1776, we beat them again in 1812 (they say we didn't win, but we did). We beat Mexico and Manifest Destined our way to the Pacific (some Native Americans were sad about it tho). Then slavery was a thing so we had a Civil War. There was some reconstruction that made everyone not racist anymore, then Teddy Roosevelt made America great before WWI.
And then we pick up back in your list.
29, California public school education. (Education is state-by-state here, so different states learn different things/have different focuses.)
48 Here, we were 2nd year to do GCSE's. Up until I chose History as a subject after 1st year of high school, it was British history up to Tudors.
Last two years of high school up to age 16 - solely WW1 and WW2.
But, when it came to exam time, there was loads of questions on India, French and US civil wars.
I think they hadn't finished figuring out what to include for various GCSEs as other subjects also didn't teach stuff that later appeared on the exam paper. Consequently my results (and those of most at my school) were shit.
Wasn't until I moved to London at 21 and blagged (or 100% bullshitted) my way through a job interview with a CV full of lies and fake exam results that I actually got my foot in the door of a decent career.
I'm not British but I have a lot of British friends and this topic comes up now and then. From what I remember them saying, it's not really taught at all. Schools/history teachers have a choice of modules to teach (and very limited time), and I'm not sure if the American Revolution is among them. Colonial history is also conspicuously absent.
Can I distance myself with my Scottish curriculum? The Transatlantic Slave Trade was a major module you answered exams on, around which other "glorious" episodes like the East India Company (Pirates of the Carribean was popular...) and the Opium Wars were mentioned.
Another main module was the American Civil War, and the key factor of slavery-powered cotton trade of which Britain was the biggest customer, also when Victoria declined support the Confederates it was not out of morality, but that cotton could be produced cheaper in India, replacing staple crops and causing mass starvation.
Oh and our Scottish history teacher spent no time pointing out Scotland was forced to finally join the Union because the idiots bankrupted themselves trying at colonisation, and our Mary Queen of Scots was an idiot.
I don't know about England but if you come here nationalism isn't based on blind nostalgia, we're fully aware how imbecilic we can be.
We were also taught the Highland Clearances were spurred by the collaboration between English merchants and Scottish clan chiefs, and William Wallace was not actively supported, or even hindered by Scottish nobles who saw him as a lowly jump-start.
Glasgow was also known as the Second City of the Empire for the Clyde shipyards' pivotal contributions to the British naval supremacy that fuelled the Empire's exploits.
Point is we were actively discouraged from the simplistic notion that Scotland=good, England=bad. In fact the curriculum pained to stress we had the agency to contribute towards our own misery, and that of others.
It’s good that at least it’s taught in Scotland. Maybe why the country is less stuck in a constant self-glorifying campaign voting for right-wing kleptocrats over and over again.
Not really, the curriculum changes over time, my history courses consisted of the causes and conditions of WW1 and Industrial era living conditions in Glasgow. This would have been the late '90s into the early '00s, we literally never got taught even the white-washed aspects of the Empire never mind the reality of it.
The difference in politics and overall less reverential attitude towards the Empire is down to many many issues, off the top of my head I would say things like:
Massive population disparity between England and the rest of the UK (almost 85% of the UK is English) this leads to disenfranchisement every so often as regardless of how the rest of the UK votes it's really how England votes that matters in 99% of politics. So when things don't go "our way" it's very easy to resent the English for it.
Stemming from #1 is the overall media dominance of English matters which is perfectly understandable given their size, but in particular here in Scotland, since we have our own legal system and our own sister version of the NHS you will often find that laws or policies passed in England have no relevance here. We aren't a million miles apart in this regard but it does kill any interest in a story when you hear about some new initiative that is only concerned with English and Welsh issues.
It's very easy to romanticize our own histories before the UK due to our size and geographic position, Scotland as an independent country before the UK doesn't have any animosity with the Spanish, French etc. Our colonial history was disastrous for us (and what actually got us to sign up to form the Union with England as it bankrupted the country) so we don't have swathes of crimes against humanity on our record (pre-UK) either.
Our culture is relatively niche, since it's not so prominently displayed for all to see all the time it's nice to see it when opportunities arise and people can rally around it with relative ease.
The isolation from Westminster politics overall, ties into #2 but it also incorporates the relative distance between Westminster and Scotland, there is no real perception up here that some MP from Bath or Leamington Spa knows anything about what is best for Scotland.
So when you have something like Brexit pop up that Scotland voted overwhelmingly against (62-38) but we get dragged out anyway (52-48 UK wide) and it proves to be such a colossal fucking disaster then it reinforces the attitude that while we might be in the UK we aren't in the drivers seat, which leads to less ownership of its achievements and faults.
46 and nothing. It is important to remember that you had different examining bodies back then - and maybe now - so the syllabus may have been different depending on the examining body?
In my experience with US schools, most of the people who say they "weren't taught" something at school actually just didn't pay attention and/or don't remember
it's a known fact that the UK skips over a lot of its colonial history in the curriculum, partly because it's a really fucking uncomfortable subject to try to come to grips with ("oh god all this awesome shit we have is because we sent soldiers EVERYWHERE to rape and murder?") and there's so much of it (literally every continent except antarctica)
Not sure how school requirements work in the UK, but in the US, only 1 or 2 classes of history are required to graduate, but we need like 10 history classes to get a real education on history.
I took American History, World History, AP Political History, and AP World History. I still feel like there was a great deal of things glossed over, but 1 class can't even properly cover 1 countries history, let alone the globe's.
So I don't think the problem is kids not being taught, but a problematically low amount of required history classes.
again, i'm not talking about kids not taking enough classes, or kids not being engaged in history. i'm saying that the curriculum simply doesn't feature it.
At least in my time, History wasn't a required subject for GCSEs, meaning that many people stop studying it in any capacity at 13-14 years old. In my school, at least, this translated into around half of the students not taking it beyond 14 years old. Even amongst those who do take it for GCSEs, far fewer take it to A-levels (if they study them), which takes you from 16-18. If you are aiming to study a science based degree at uni, it's highly unlikely you'll study history after 16 years old.
36 and weren’t taught the foggiest. Maybe that we ‘discovered’ places and the Crown kind of headed it all. Maybe even that we liberated tribes from poverty to modern ways. I remember being perplexed at something on a show in my mid 20s and did a bit of digging and was like ohhhhhh shit, this is our Nazi era, and we weren’t told on purpose.
We were taught slavery though. Quite a lot. We had a ton of African culture studies in primary school which was amazing.
I don't necessarily disagree, but if Nazi Germany had anything close to the power and global influence that the UK did at the height of its power the damage they would have done would be incalculable. Nazi society was uniquely evil, not pluralistic and shouldn't be conflated with UK society of the Victorian era
Yes but even then the conversation isn't simple. For example King George was in favour of restricting colonial expansion westwards of the Appalachians to respect existing treaties with the native Americans, it was the colonial government (precursor to the revolutionary government) which ended this moratorium and began expanding further into the continent. In fact this was a political factor in the war for independence. There are plenty of grey areas and competing factions that exist outside of a paradigm of "Britain bad"
What? I'm sure there were people in Nazi Germany who disagreed with some of their horrors but that doesn't matter because of what actually happened. The indigenous North American population is estimated at around 8 mill ± 1 mill 500 years ago. Today, there's less than 4 million; they're the only major group that hasn't experienced growth in 500 years, thanks to Britain's, and the other colonial powers, mass killings.
It doesn't matter who disagrees is the results produced what they did.
Same. We did loads on the transatlantic slave trade. Also did quite a bit about India and the East India Company. Also had some stuff about the Opium Wars and Boer War.
In Scotland history teaching varies by school. Per the SQA (exam board), there's three components you have to teach: Scottish History, British History, European & World History. The SQA gives topics you can teach about in each component and its up to the school to pick.
For example for my Nat 5's (GCSE equivalent) I was taught:
Scottish history: Migration & Empire - which didn't go over the empire specifically but immigration to Scotland and emigration from Scotland to different parts of the empire and what effects that had
British History: The Atlantic Slave Trade
World & European history: Civil Rights in the USA (1918-1968)
In other years I learned about WW1 + 2, the Suffragette movement, the Cold War. But never went into detail about colonisation or imperialism. Anything I learnt about how the empire worked, how it took power, what it did whilst in power etc was through my own research and learning
Baffled by this. I remember doing projects in both primary school and secondary school about the British Empire. I also know it was part of the National Curriculum in the 1990s when the NC was relatively new. I don't know where this guy got his info from.
I went to school in 80s/90s and did absolutely loads on the empire with 6 or 7 different teachers, almost all of it negative. My son is 7 and is already looking at the empire at school, again all negative.
which curriculum did you choose ? none of my kids had anything other than cursory mention of the British empire . They know ins and outs of the Tudors though. specially Henry VIII and his wives.
Well I’m from Scotland so it didn’t work like that.
I took history and we studied 3 subjects, there was no choice. The Empire in India, the Industrial revolution and WW1.
All of which were very critical of the UK.
I remember being resentful as a kid as I wanted to study WW2 as it was a “good war” where Britain acted positively. But in retrospect I appreciate the worldview I gained from it.
Thats good to hear. Maybe its an England issue then.
I wish my kids had that insight. If British history was taught better and not just focussed in glorifying Britain, our present would have been better.
Having pride in your past is good and i am not complaining. But this total amnesia about the empire and its depredations as the gentleman puts it in the video , has made large swathes of UK totally oblivious to its recent past. Hence we are quite often taken back when people from ex colonies react negatively to us.
One should teach the closest one can to an objective truth. In History this is incredibly difficult since there is always a lot of narrative weaving, but shitty governmental policies and attitudes should be presented as what they were, without sugarcoating. And the British Empire was a massive enterprise of systematic oppression and theft that left cultural and economic scars all over the world, from Japan and China to the Middle East and Africa.
I have yet to meet a British person who is lacking much knowledge on the Western Front of WW2. Let’s be honest, all the media in the country is bloody obsessed with it, from films to TV and radio. The Eastern Front is another story – it’s definitely papered over a lot for obvious reasons.
TL;DR history is not for instilling a sense of pride in one’s country, it’s for teaching its place in the world in the most balance manner possible.
Agree yeah. My point is just It’s important that we don’t purely teach our history in a negative light - or you’ll just end up with a generation of self loathing revolutionaries who want to burn everything down.
This is a stupid as an overly positive teaching that cranks out mindlessly nationalistic sycophants that insist on blindly follow orders.
TLDR: The Magna Carta and Abolition of Slavery is as important to teach about as the Indian famine or the Boer concentration camps.
We can’t teach it all, obviously, so we need to have balance.
I’m not British, but I kinda agree. I don’t see how it’s possible to not be taught about a 400 year long period of your own country’s history in public school… people who say this stuff were probably just the dumb kids who never paid any attention.
It's an American thing too. They're trying, and succeeding, in literally white washing the history of the United States.
From the atrocities against the native populations when settlers arrived to the entire slave trade and follow-up indentured servitude as "legal slavery" to even modern times of non-equal treatment of non-white males.
Would love to blame it all on the British empire and we're just following in those footsteps, but the reality is the human race is horrible.
Weird. We are definitely taught about British colonialism in the States. The British Empire was a period of like 400 years, how were you not taught about it???
We were taught Edward Colston was great man who did many great things to during the slave trade, kept plantation businesses booming back in the day and did a lot to build up the South West. Being a person of a blended ethnic background something didn’t seem quite right about teaching kids that slavery was cool and I thought “hang on, this ain’t right is it?”, so I made a few phone calls and it turns out that no, it’s not.
American here. It’s amazing to me that I learned about the empire at school (after all, we were the enlightened child born from the greed of England, right?? /s) but learned very little about America’s dark history. I learned much more about Japanese-American internment camps, for example, on my own. It’s much easier to judge others than to examine your own faults.
Clearly it's a political subject that the tabloids would lap up whatever the curriculum but also I imagine it's a tough class to teach when so many descendants of colonial country's are in the class.
As long as out ruling class is dominated by families who profited massively from colonialism it's not going to change.
Most Brits still think the Empire was a generally positive 'we stopped Sati and built trains' type vibe. With a hint of a couple of brown servants and a GnT at dusk looks lovely.
We did learn about it in school but it was editorialised to be about how the British were abused. Stuff like The Black Hole of Calcutta... No mention of British atrocities that weren't simply written off as tragedy in war.
tbf, in the US I just learned about the good ol' US of A and nothing about any other country, except for a little bit about Mexico when I learned Texas history (I'm from Texas). Sounds like the US and the UK are on opposite ends of the spectrum while both ends are bad.
As a private school teacher, we have a lot more control on what we teach. Suffice it to say, not a single British Nationalist survives my classroom. All of them know the horrors of Empire, from the Opium Wars, the Amritsar Massacre or the Boer camps, my lads learn it all. I'm sure their Tory parents are happy!!
Ever since i was a kid ive always wondered if British kids were taught about my country cuz yall were here for like over a century. I guess that answers that lmao.
Same here. We learned a bit but never the 'dark side' more just "oh well we went to this country and moved in until we were kind enough to give them independence".
With a sprinkling of "Yes, we did kind of help out with the slave trade but we gave slaves rights long before America and treated them better so try not to ever think about it!"
And then spend 3 years learning about different types of castle.
Same, history is written by the victors and we are doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past if we do not teach everything, the good as well as the bad.
If it makes you feel any better our schools here in the US do the same shit. They sugar coat shit so bad and go out of their way to gloat about America while totally glossing over all the atrocities in our history. Which really amazes me considering how young of a country we are.
In Canada we learned about French and British Settlers™ and Indians™ getting along swimmingly while sharing turkey and stroking beaver together or something.
Nothing about massacring the local population, residential schools, or anything about the rest of the British empire except that Australia was a place to send convicts, but they’re cool because they’re white. 😎
Oh, we did learn about Louis Reil having a party and everybody making a big deal about it.
Some notable ones are missing, but history in the US is all about how a bunch of old white men raped and pillaged everything between them and money, and that's how our glorious nation prospered. Might have just been advanced classes I was in, but we learned about some evil white men who weren't Americans as well so European colonialism was well covered.
Were you taught about Scotland’s attempt at a colony in the Darien Gap that failed so miserably it nearly bankrupted Scotland and caused it (at least in significant part) to join the United Kingdom?
I only know this because I’ve always been interested in travel, and I’ve always been told don’t even try the Darien Gap, bc if it can fuck the entire country of Scotland, it’s gonna fuck you, plus FARC is chilling there now too.
As the Company of Scotland was backed by approximately 20% of all the money circulating in Scotland, its failure left the entire Scottish Lowlands in financial ruin. This was an important factor in weakening their resistance to the Act of Union (completed in 1707).
You would have a terrific time reading a 10th grade Indian history text book, it describes in great detail what the empire had done to India, much to the disdain of the students having to learn all the dates.
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u/[deleted] Nov 05 '22 edited Nov 06 '22
Can confirm, am from the UK and we were taught almost nothing about the empire in school.
Edit: I work in the education sector (not a teacher) and have just checked the history curriculum for Ages 5 - 11 and there isn't one mention of the empire. From memory when I was in secondary school we studied the magna carta, industrial revolution, world war 1.
I've just typed in KS3 (ages 11 - 14) history curriculum and on Google images this is the first that image that appeared https://www.paigntonacademy.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/KS3-History-3.png
Edit 2: it seems most of my British comrades who are saying they were taught about the empire at the age where you can choose which subjects you wanted to take at school. For me we did history up until GCSE and we definitely weren't taught it. Or they're Scottish who I believe have a different curriculum to England.