# From what perspective is the American Revolutionary War taught to British schoolchildren? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 3, 2010, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456 "2010-07-03T21:23:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/181 "2010-07-06T15:32:11Z")
> [@Spoke](#): > > I would think the British would want their children to know a little about the origins of their major ally. Sorry if that seems “insane” to you. > > For all the accusations we hear on these boards of Americans being provincial, I am beginning to think it is the other way around. 😃 The issue is not that the American Revolution is unimportant. Of course it is important. The issue is one of _comparative_ importance. Given a limited amount of time, is this event more, or less, important than many other events which ought to be included, when discussing world history at the introductory level? For example - given the importance of China in today’s world, the fact that most school-kids learned _nothing whatsoever_ of Chinese history when I was a schoolkid seems remarkable. ---
**Author:** ![BMalion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e274bd/32.png) [@BMalion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BMalion)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/182 "2010-07-06T15:35:57Z")
> [@Bytegeist](#): > > Well how about the [Pig War](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pig_War) then? > \* > The Pig War was a confrontation in 1859 between American and British authorities over the boundary between the United States and British North America. […] The Pig War, so called because it was triggered by the shooting of a pig, is also called the Pig Episode, the Pig and Potato War, the San Juan Boundary Dispute or the Northwestern Boundary Dispute. The pig was the only “casualty” of the war, making the conflict otherwise bloodless. > \* > > Don’t tell me you guys gloss over that one too. "There may come a day, when we break all bands of fellowship an never eat pork again, but it is not this day!" ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/183 "2010-07-06T15:39:43Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > For example - given the importance of China in today’s world, the fact that most school-kids learned _nothing whatsoever_ of Chinese history when I was a schoolkid seems remarkable. Wow. You didn’t learn _anything_ about China? I’m beginning to think my rural public school American education wasn’t so bad. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/184 "2010-07-06T15:39:53Z")
Wasn’t covered at all (I went to private schools). The only bits of American History I remember covering at all were the age of exploration (not really American anyway) and the 1940s. I think the latter was covered only because it figured into World War II (ie., Lend-Lease, direct US involvement in the war, the atom bomb, and so on). ---
**Author:** ![Hypnagogic\_Jerk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hypnagogic_jerk/32/4252_2.png) [@Hypnagogic\_Jerk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypnagogic_Jerk)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/185 "2010-07-06T15:44:27Z")
> [@hogarth](#): > > All I remember is that Laurier was in a bind because English Canadians favoured conscription and French Canadians were opposed. I was about to say that you confused the Second Boer War with World War I, but apparently there was talk of conscription during the Boer War as well. It just didn’t happen (Canada sent volunteers), unlike in World War I. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/186 "2010-07-06T15:47:47Z")
> [@Spoke](#): > > Wow. You didn’t learn _anything_ about China? I’m beginning to think my rural public school American education wasn’t so bad. 😉 No, our “world history” bit was almost entirely euro-based, from what I recall. Mind you, it wasn’t very long. The Chinese may have been mentioned, as in “there were the following centres of ancient civilization …” but no discission of Mao, the Long March, Sun Yat-Sen, the Taiping Rebellion, the Opium Wars, etc. etc. After that, there was a 'history of North America" class, which did indeed cover the American Revolution and the War of 1812, among other things. We even did a field trip to the Niagara Penninsula, to visit the site of 1812-era battles. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/187 "2010-07-06T15:50:58Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Of course, American independence was inevitable anyway. You can blame North and Sandwich for losing the Colonies in 1783, but there is little chance that America does not become one or more independent states at some point, probably in the 19th century. Maybe, maybe not. After all, Britain managed to keep hold of Canada and Australia until the 20th Century, and still has Scotland. I don’t see why the 13 Colonies should be any different. ---
**Author:** ![tagos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@tagos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tagos)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/188 "2010-07-06T16:12:50Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > Maybe, maybe not. After all, Britain managed to keep hold of Canada and Australia until the 20th Century, and still has Scotland. I don’t see why the 13 Colonies should be any different. Scotland is not and never has been a colony. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/189 "2010-07-06T16:23:05Z")
Of course it wasn’t. Hoiwever, in many ways the American Revolution was as much an internal British dispute as the Jacobite Uprisng some 30-odd years earlier. Furthermore, I’d say that up until the mid-18th Century, the American colonies had closer ties to England than Scotland did. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/190 "2010-07-06T16:52:31Z")
That’s a bit much. It’s not like there was ever an American king of England. You could say that the relationship between England and the colonies was less contentious, but not closer. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/191 "2010-07-06T16:57:54Z")
There was also never an independent American kingdom. It wouldn’t be wrong to say that until the 1770’s most Americans though of themselves as Englishmen who happened to be living overseas. ---
**Author:** ![SanVito](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sanvito/32/2805_2.png) [@SanVito](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SanVito)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/192 "2010-07-06T17:05:12Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > There was also never an independent American kingdom. > > It wouldn’t be wrong to say that until the 1770’s most Americans though of themselves as Englishmen who happened to be living overseas. I can’t work out where you’re going with bringing Scotland into the mix. The UK was formed as a merger, not a conquest. The colonials were British, not just English. The US beat the British, not the English. Just because Parliament and the King sit in London doesn’t mean England has enslaved the Scots??? ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/193 "2010-07-06T17:09:05Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > There was also never an independent American kingdom. > > It wouldn’t be wrong to say that until the 1770’s most Americans though of themselves as Englishmen who happened to be living overseas. The _English_ ones thought of themselves as English, sure. But lots of them were Scottish- not to mention Welsh and Irish. Plus French, Italian, Spanish, Prussian, Russian, Dutch, Swedish… ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Panda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ee7513/32.png) [@Darth\_Panda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Panda)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/194 "2010-07-06T17:10:39Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > The issue is not that the American Revolution is unimportant. Of course it is important. > > The issue is one of _comparative_ importance. Given a limited amount of time, is this event more, or less, important than many other events which ought to be included, when discussing world history at the introductory level? > > For example - given the importance of China in today’s world, the fact that most school-kids learned _nothing whatsoever_ of Chinese history when I was a schoolkid seems remarkable. One of the most memorable things from social studies for me was watching The Last Emperor in my 9th grade history class - great movie. China wasn’t as big of a deal in the early 90s as it is now, but we still spent about week on it in 9th grade and another in 10th. I would hope kids now would spend a little more. Again, I think the fact that in New York state 2 years of world history is mandatory makes the perspective a little different. From the comments in this thread, it doesn’t seem like the U.K. has as much mandatory world history - quite possible because they have so much more national history to cover, but also perhaps from the nature of your secondary school - with students specializing to a greater degree than stduents in the US might (I think someone said their was no mandatory history classes after age 15 for them, that is quite different from our system). ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/195 "2010-07-06T17:13:46Z")
> [@SanVito](#): > > I can’t work out where you’re going with bringing Scotland into the mix. The UK was formed as a merger, not a conquest. The colonials were British, not just English. The US beat the British, not the English. Just because Parliament and the King sit in London doesn’t mean England has enslaved the Scots??? What I’m saying is that if the English hadn’t defeated Charles Stuart in 1745 and them acted to bring the two nations closer, Scotland could have become an independet state in the 18th Century and still be one today. Conversely, if the British had behaved differently in 1775-1783, they could gave retained their colonies for as long as they did Canada or Australia, or even longer. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/196 "2010-07-06T17:13:55Z")
> [@Spoke](#): > > I would think the British would want their children to know a little about the origins of their major ally. And “a little” is what people are suggesting they need to learn. Again, how much time do you think should be devoted to it? And if it’s more than a little, what do you want to bump to make room for it? English kids have a lot of history to review. [QUOTE=Alessan] Maybe, maybe not. After all, Britain managed to keep hold of Canada and Australia until the 20th Century, and still has Scotland. I don’t see why the 13 Colonies should be any different. [/QUOTE] Wow. 1. Scotland’s not a colony and never was, 2. Canada’s independence, quite recently celebrated, was on July 1, 1867. 3. The reason Canada and Australia gained independence later is simply that they were not formed, distinct societies at the same time the USA was. In 1776 Canada wasn’t really a political entity of any kind; it was a recently conquered French possession with tiny English settlements on the outskirts of Quebec. There wasn’t really anything to give independence TO. None of the cities that were important in the formation of Upper Canada, like Toronto, Kingston, or Hamilton, had even been formally founded, and the population of all of Lower Canada (Quebec) was probably about one twentieth that of the 13 Colonies. It’s worth noting that once Canada did start to become a coherent political entity, notably after the War of 1812, there was immediate agitation for independence and some violence. Australia is much the same story but in many ways a few decades younger. It’s just not really realistic that the UK could have held on to the USA much beyond the early 19th century, for the same reason they couldn’t have held on to Canada or Australia much longer than they did; nationalism would inevitably have caused a break. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/197 "2010-07-06T17:17:56Z")
> [@Spoke](#): > > I would think the British would want their children to know a little about the origins of their major ally. Sorry if that seems “insane” to you. Oh, we covered _tons_ of [Portuguese history](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Portuguese_Alliance). 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Panda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ee7513/32.png) [@Darth\_Panda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Panda)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/198 "2010-07-06T17:20:00Z")
> [@hogarth](#): > > By that logic (counting subjects), the independence of the Philippines must be a very major event in American history, since they were much larger than 4 million subjects in 1946. > > How much time does a typical American history class spend on the history of independence in the Philippines (1898-1946)? The US in 1946 had a considerably higher population than England in 1783. I’m not sure how much time the typical US student spends on it, but my class only covered it as part of the overall aftermath of WWII - which was a very large topic. ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Panda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ee7513/32.png) [@Darth\_Panda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Panda)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/199 "2010-07-06T17:21:47Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > And “a little” is what people are suggesting they need to learn. > > Again, how much time do you think should be devoted to it? And if it’s more than a little, what do you want to bump to make room for it? English kids have a lot of history to review. My suggestion was about 2 or 3 lectures. I’m not familiar enough with the overall curriculum to recommend the best adjustments to make - I think a panel of historians and educators would probably be a good way to approach it. ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/200 "2010-07-06T17:22:35Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > What I’m saying is that if the English hadn’t defeated Charles Stuart in 1745 and them acted to bring the two nations closer, Scotland could have become an independet state in the 18th Century and still be one today. The Union of Scotland and England was in 1707, and plenty Scots fought against the Jacobites. I’m really not sure what you’re driving at here. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456.md?page=11)