# 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:** 14
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/261 "2010-07-07T20:25:27Z")
> [@Candyman74](#): > > Well, if you’re gonna play the “it wouldn’t have happened without X” card, how far can we go back? The American Revolution wouldn’t have happened without a number of factors, and they wouldn’t have happened without a number of factors each. You don’t get to just draw the line at the thing _you_ value the most. > > So the birth of the “evil tyrant” King George was the most important event in the world. To my mind, the English Civil War was, very arguably, more significant; out of that struggle, and the reactions to it, came many of the concepts that found reflection in the American Revolution. ---
**Author:** ![kidchameleon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/898d66/32.png) [@kidchameleon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kidchameleon)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/262 "2010-07-07T20:57:07Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > The American Revolution was not fought on British soil King George III seemed to disagree. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/263 "2010-07-07T21:02:55Z")
> [@Candyman74](#): > > Well, if you’re gonna play the “it wouldn’t have happened without X” card, how far can we go back? The American Revolution wouldn’t have happened without a number of factors, and they wouldn’t have happened without a number of factors each. You don’t get to just draw the line at the thing _you_ value the most. > > So the birth of the “evil tyrant” King George was the most important event in the world. Are you confusing me with another poster. Someone did say that a pundit claimed that that the American Revolution was the most important blah blah blah. I, however, did not. I was commenting that a teacher thinking the French Revolution was realy so important was odd and probably wrongheaded. > [@](#): > > How can you claim that European influences weren’t instrumental in American development? Your “founders” (that’s the word you use for the signatories of the DoI, isn’t it? or am I mistaking it for the folks on the Mayflower?) - but, anyway, those sigantories - many of them soent a lot of time in Europe after the declaration. It’s not like a big wall was built, and Europe was still vital to America for many decades after (well, still is, despite many US opinions - and vice versa, of course). … What? Are you talking to me? Why would you even ask me this? 😕 ---
**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 7, 2010, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/264 "2010-07-07T21:16:59Z")
> [@scifisam2009](#): > > Darth, yup, you are misinterpreting those comments - and taking them out of context - just like you did when I said ‘we don’t care.’ > > Was the 55 minutes a day Social Studies rather than history? That sounds more like what we do have here these days, because we used to always study history, geography, citizenship (or the former equivalents) as discreet subjects, but kids now generally study ‘humanities’ which flips between those topics, often combining them (my daughter’s school includes religious education as part of humanities too). > > How come there was no art, computing, technology, music, drama and so on the curriculum at your school? Is that something to do with elective afterschool clubs providing those subjects instead (and sometimes counting towards your high school diploma)? Here, they’re part of the regular curriculum (up to age 16). It simply would not be possible to have almost an hour a day of history without greatly diminishing the other subjects. Please tell me how you interpret these specific quotes - I’ll narrow it down so you don’t have to look through a bunch: 1. > [@](#): > > Originally Posted by Rumor\_Watkins > And, once again, it’s totally irrelevant to someone learning it in the context of world history 1. > [@](#): > > Originally Posted by dtilque > That war is important to Americans, but not really to anyone else. 1. > [@](#): > > Originally Posted by Shakester > many Americans seem to have a major problem in grasping just how irrelevant US history is to the rest of the world. My interpretations: 1. The AR is totally irrelevant in the context of world history. 2. The AR is not important to anyone besides Americans. 3. US history is irrelevant to the rest of the world. Are these way off the mark in your opinion? As to the rest of your questions: I took Band - which is a fine art. Other students may have taken things like painting or choir instead. I took it for all four years. Computing was not part of my curriculum in the early 90s - it may have been for others. Drama was an after school activity for us. One thing to keep in mind is that since every student was required to take theology as a full schedule course, it left us less time for electives than students at public school s- in a way, it was our elective, except that we didn’t elect to take it 🙂 ETA: sorry I forgot to reply to the Social Studies questions - it’s a generic term in the US, we use it from elementary through high school to describe things like history, culture, politics, etc. For HS, it was all 2 years of global history, 1 year of US history, and 1 year split between economics and political science. ---
**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 7, 2010, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/265 "2010-07-07T21:48:23Z")
> [@Darth\_Panda](#): > > My interpretations: > > 1. The AR is totally irrelevant in the context of world history. > > 2. The AR is not important to anyone besides Americans. > > 3. US history is irrelevant to the rest of the world. Given the context, I interpret the first quote to mean that the American Revolution was not particularly important to any other country. I interpret the third one to mean that Americans think everyone in the world learns about American history because, “America, fuck yeah!” ---
**Author:** ![amanset](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8dc957/32.png) [@amanset](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amanset)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/266 "2010-07-07T21:54:40Z")
> [@Scheidt-Hoch](#): > > Well you’re misreading the quote from my post that you have there: I did not say that the American war of independence was 'irrelevant". I actually said that to modern British kids it is **less** relevant than the struggle for Indian independence. Maybe you should re-read some of the others on your list as well. Mine also suffered from Fox-Newsd style editing, leaving off the bit where I said that when you grew up with a Norman castle around the corner from your house (and I did, it was about a ten minute walk away), THEN a little spat across the pond pales into insignificance. I was clearly repeating what others had said about how local history generally speaking trumps all others. I’m sorry, but I grew up somewhere with a lot of local history. ---
**Author:** ![amanset](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8dc957/32.png) [@amanset](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amanset)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/267 "2010-07-07T22:05:24Z")
> [@scifisam2009](#): > > Was the 55 minutes a day Social Studies rather than history? That sounds more like what we do have here these days, because we used to always study history, geography, citizenship (or the former equivalents) as discreet subjects, but kids now generally study ‘humanities’ which flips between those topics, often combining them (my daughter’s school includes religious education as part of humanities too). Same here. I went to a rather traditional independent school run by Irish priests out in the Warwickshire countryside. Physics, chemistry, biology and computing were all separate subjects - no “science” course - as were history and geography - no “humanities” course. Also from the age of 14 onwards (4th form and upwards for the GCSEs) the only mandatory subjects were maths, English language, English literature and religious studies. I actually dropped history at the end of third form (age 13-14). ---
**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 7, 2010, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/268 "2010-07-07T22:06:31Z")
> [@amanset](#): > > Mine also suffered from Fox-Newsd style editing, leaving off the bit where I said that when you grew up with a Norman castle around the corner from your house (and I did, it was about a ten minute walk away), THEN a little spat across the pond pales into insignificance. I was clearly repeating what others had said about how local history generally speaking trumps all others. I’m sorry, but I grew up somewhere with a lot of local history. I didn’t think anyone would read all of the quotes if I included the entire posts - and, yes, I did pick out the parts that stood out as indicating that the poster didn’t think that the AR was relevant to world history. It would have been kind of silly to leave those parts out considering that the poster had asked me to find posts were someone had said the AR was irrelevant. But you did say that the AR paled into insignifignce. Main Entry: in·sig·nif·i·cant : not significant: as a : lacking meaning or import : inconsequential b : not worth considering : unimportant c : lacking weight, position, or influence : contemptible d : small in size, quantity, or number > **[Definition of INSIGNIFICANT](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/insignificant)** > > not significant: such as; lacking meaning or import; small in size, quantity, or number… See the full definition Perhaps you meant to say that it pales in significance? That would be different than saying that it actually becomes insignificant due to your surroundings. ---
**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 7, 2010, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/269 "2010-07-07T22:09:55Z")
> [@amanset](#): > > Same here. I went to a rather traditional independent school run by Irish priests out in the Warwickshire countryside. Physics, chemistry, biology and computing were all separate subjects - no “science” course - as were history and geography - no “humanities” course. > > Also from the age of 14 onwards (4th form and upwards for the GCSEs) the only mandatory subjects were maths, English language, English literature and religious studies. I actually dropped history at the end of third form (age 13-14). I used the term science in describing our schedule because we always had 1 science course in each year. They were: Freshman: Earth Science Sophomore: Chemistry Junior: Biology Senior: Physics Geography was often blended into our history courses, but we spent more time on this junior high school than in high school. ---
**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 7, 2010, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/270 "2010-07-07T22:12:09Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Given the context, I interpret the first quote to mean that the American Revolution was not particularly important to any other country. > > I interpret the third one to mean that Americans think everyone in the world learns about American history because, “America, fuck yeah!” Regarding the first one, why would you use the words “not particularly important” rather than the poster’s actual words, which were “totally irrelevant.” What is the justification for the switch? ETA: also, I don’t see why the poster of the third quote would say “just how irrelevant US history is” unless he or she thought that US history was irrelevant. Now, they may well have intended to express the principal you state as your reading of their statement, but they also seem to be clearly indicating their belief that US history is irrelevant, which I believe to be incorrect. ---
**Author:** ![Fake\_Tales\_of\_San\_Francisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8491ac/32.png) [@Fake\_Tales\_of\_San\_Francisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fake_Tales_of_San_Francisco)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/271 "2010-07-07T22:16:44Z")
I think people are (perhaps unnecessarily) using hyperbole to drive the point home that we don’t go into any kind of meaningful depth in the subject in Britain. Not a particularly useful thing to do in a thread in GQ I have to say. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/272 "2010-07-07T22:18:59Z")
> [@Darth\_Panda](#): > > I think you’ve overlooked some posts - either that or we’re interpreting them differently. Let me know what you think. Sorry, mate, but there is no way in the world that I’m going to look back in the thread to hunt for those posts and see the context they were posted in; it’d take bloody ages! Taking them out of context, and with no links, renders them meaningless. It’d be like taking the word ‘meaningless’ out of this post and quoting it as saying that the AWI was meaningless. ---
**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 7, 2010, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/273 "2010-07-07T22:28:54Z")
> [@scifisam2009](#): > > Sorry, mate, but there is no way in the world that I’m going to look back in the thread to hunt for those posts and see the context they were posted in; it’d take bloody ages! > > Taking them out of context, and with no links, renders them meaningless. It’d be like taking the word ‘meaningless’ out of this post and quoting it as saying that the AWI was meaningless. No - that’s crazy. If I wanted to misquote you, I’d do this: > [@scifisam2009](#): > > the AWI was meaningless. :D:D:D ETA: I am sorry that the links are gone from the posts above, that wasn’t intentional and I didn’t notice until you mentioned it. ---
**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 7, 2010, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/274 "2010-07-07T23:01:11Z")
> [@Darth\_Panda](#): > > I didn’t think anyone would read all of the quotes if I included the entire posts - and, yes, I did pick out the parts that stood out as indicating that the poster didn’t think that the AR was relevant to world history. It would have been kind of silly to leave those parts out considering that the poster had asked me to find posts were someone had said the AR was irrelevant. > > But you did say that the AR paled into insignifignce. > > Main Entry: in·sig·nif·i·cant > > : not significant: as a : lacking meaning or import : inconsequential b : not worth considering : unimportant c : lacking weight, position, or influence : contemptible d : small in size, quantity, or number > > [INSIGNIFICANT Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster](http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/insignificant) > > Perhaps you meant to say that it pales in significance? That would be different than saying that it actually becomes insignificant due to your surroundings. You know what - I regret making this post, it’s needlessly pedantic and argumentative. I apologize if you don’t think I treated your previous post fairly. ---
**Author:** ![kim\_jung\_il](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/54ee81/32.png) [@kim\_jung\_il](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kim_jung_il)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 6:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/275 "2010-07-08T06:11:45Z")
> [@Darth\_Panda](#): > > You know what - I regret making this post, it’s needlessly pedantic and argumentative. > > I apologize if you don’t think I treated your previous post fairly. And it’s an American English dictionary link you have quoted, which is slightly less significant than a British English Dictionary 😉 Sorry 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![amanset](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8dc957/32.png) [@amanset](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amanset)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 7:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/276 "2010-07-08T07:24:00Z")
> [@Darth\_Panda](#): > > You know what - I regret making this post, it’s needlessly pedantic and argumentative. > > I apologize if you don’t think I treated your previous post fairly. Accepted. If only others (probably including me) could act similarly on this board. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 9:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/277 "2010-07-08T09:49:49Z")
[QUOTE=Spoke;12654226As for what kids are taught, I think it’s telling that **Nava** ’s teachers glossed over Spain’s loss of its own American colonies (even though that was an objectively important event in Spanish history). I suspect that most nations tend to approach their own history with a sort of triumphalism (or at least national pride) and episodes that interfere with that storyline tend to get de-emphasized.[/QUOTE] We didn’t learn about how our country was built, either, everything was completely Castillian-centric. The Kingdom of Navarre wasn’t mentioned even once in my Spanish History class, and we _were_ in Navarre. On the other hand, now there are regions whose curriculum is being designed locally and which are completely centered on them; the whole thing stinks of 1984 rewriting, up to and including the creation of some entities which never existed pre-2000A.D. or so. Catalan Empire? What Catalan Empire? The curriculum is a political instrument. What can turn it into an actual lesson (or refrain from doing so) is the teachers. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/278 "2010-07-08T14:32:02Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > It even explains the geographical extraction of those guys (all the ones you name were from a place with very poor land, where nth sons got exactly nothing and which had been the war’s front for the last 500 years). Incidentally, I have been to Trujillo (Pizarro’s hometown) a couple of times. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![kushiel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bbce88/32.png) [@kushiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kushiel)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/279 "2010-07-08T16:30:23Z")
> [@hogarth](#): > > Actually, when I went to school in Saskatchewan, we learned next to nothing about the War of 1812 – I think that’s more of an Ontario thing. Not surprisingly, we learned a lot more about the [North-West Rebellion](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North-West_Rebellion) and Louis Riel. > > I’m going to go out on a limb and say that if a battlefield is near your school, you’re much more likely to learn about that battle. 🙂 Just showed up for a ‘me too’ post. North-West Rebellion/Louis Riel was elementary school, and the three years of high school were ‘The Industrial Revolution - England and France learned about factories and hygiene’, ‘World History but mostly WWII - hey I get to research Hirohito!’ and then ‘Canada - a couple centuries of fur traders, explorers, missionaries and why did I skip World History for this?’. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/280 "2010-07-09T14:37:42Z")
My two pennorth (racking my memory), The Normans, the Romans, the Norse invasions plus the civilisations of the the Fertile Crescent and Egypt(junior school) In Grammar school, Chinese history (from at least the Tang dynasty until the Communist supremacy ) for which I was, and am, mystified as to why we had to study it. Also the Industrial Revolution, and last but INCREDIBLY boring, the Corn Laws. I’ve no doubt that we studied other history but can’t remember it. I seriously think that the topics given us in senior school were chosen as some sort of character test to see if we could still study and absorb knowledge about subjects that seemed to have little relevance to us and that were dull as ditchwater. (Though I found the earlier Chinese history quite interesting) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456.md?page=13) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456.md?page=15)