# 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:** 8
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/141 "2010-07-05T14:31:15Z")
> [@MarcusF](#): > > The basic answer to the OP is that it is not taught from any particular perspective – as a rule it is not taught at all. This is not because Brits somehow feel the need to down play the significance of the American War of Independence – of course it was important both at the time and in what it meant for the future – or the USA as a country but because history teaching in English schools is in a mess generally. > > From my point of view (back in 1970 I was allowed to drop history at the age of 14 – what’s the use of history to someone interested in science?! – but did a history degree in my own time many years later) the major problem is the lack of an overarching narrative. Look at that list \*\*scifisam \*\*linked to for the KS3 curriculum, lots of interesting topics but no structure. Kids end up knowing a lot about specific themes – slavery, the Glorious Revolution, Elizabeth 1, middle class life in 1900, etc – but will not have much idea of how it all fits together. And as it says, it is not compulsory to cover all these topics. The AWI may get a mention in relation to the Unit 16, France 1789-94 why was there a revolution?, as our Irish friends have mentioned, but if the school chooses not to do this there is no topic to hang it on at all. (Incidentally, notice that although there is a topic on the causes of the French Revolution, there is nothing on the Revolution itself and the subsequent Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars – in fact “Napoleon, who is this Napoleon guy?”) > > GCSE History, Key Stage 4, 14-16 year olds, is even worse. Again it is topic driven but this time there are fewer topics, maybe a total of six to eight covered in the two years. I checked with my daughter who did her GCSEs four years ago and she can’t remember anything from school about this period at all. Effectively she jumped from the English Civil War to the First World War with nothing in between! Plenty about the United States here though: the 20th century dominated the GCSE curriculum she did and that was heavily weighted to the US – post-WW1 treaties, the Great Depression, the Cold War/Vietnam, Civil Rights, etc. The lack of background knowledge is now a bit of a problem when trying to understand English Literature and Art History for her degree! > > As a general point I don’t think those teaching British history have any problem with or are embarrassed by Britain losing colonies, they are much more likely to be embarrassed by acquiring colonies and the idea of the British Empire. Independance for the 13 Colonies, however bad it was judged at the time, would - to most people - just seem inevitable in the long term. Australia gained independance, Canada gained independance, India gained independance, all the African colonies gained independance. Some were given up after a struggle, some were waved off peacefully. The United States just got there earlier! She probably did ‘20th Century History’ GCSE. There are other history GCSEs that are broader. History teaching isn’t particularly well structured, but there are so many competing interests that it’s impossible to please them all. At least these days secondary school history isn’t all spinning Jennies and other farm machinery. 😃 > [@Darth\_Panda](#): > > This is reasonable. There’s a difference between saying that there simply isn’t enough time to cover everyhing and saying that something is completely irrelevant, or to that “nobody cares.” I said ‘nobody cares’ in the context of someone saying that we don’t teach about American Independence because we’re, apparently, averse to talking about our past defeats. Nobody cares about losing the colonies. (Well, I’m sure there’s the odd nutter who does, but you can find extreme outliers for any POV). And I did also say that we have a limited amount of time to teach a lot of history. Several people have said that. It’s a good point, but not a new one. I’m genuinely curious - what, exactly, do you think that British schoolchildren would learn from being taught more about the AWI? ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/142 "2010-07-05T14:31:33Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > And of course, Americans study the history of Britain in a lot of detail, and usually Egypt, Greece, Rome, and Spain in lesser detail. > [@hogarth](#): > > I can’t speak for the U.S. (I’m Canadian), but we certainly didn’t study British history in a lot of detail. Just selected high points like the Norman Conquest and the Magna Carta, and Britain’s role in general world (or Canadian) history. I never learned about the English Civil War in school, for instance, or anything about Britain’s relations with Ireland. But maybe my school just sucked. 🙂 I am an American, and we definitely did not cover British history in much detail or really anything about British history that did not directly relate to the US when I was in school. It pretty much just came up in the context of the American Revolution and then WWII. Oh, we learned about the Magna Carta too, but again primarily just its relevance to the US Constitution. To throw out an anecdote, when I was about 11 years old I remember seeing the TV adaptation of _[Back Home](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Back_Home_%28novel%29)_. It’s about an English girl who was evacuated to the US during WWII, and by the time she comes home is quite Americanized and has a hard time readjusting to life in the UK. There’s a classroom scene where the teacher asks if anyone can explain the causes of the Civil War. The girl raises her hand and starts talking about slavery and state’s rights. She’s surprised and embarrassed when the teacher tells her they’re not discussing the _American_ Civil War. My (college educated and fairly intelligent) mother was sitting right there, so I asked her what the English Civil War was about. She said “They didn’t have one. They must be learning about the French Revolution.” :smack: I am now also a college educated adult myself, and can’t really blame my mother for her ignorance on this point because I’m pretty sure I never had a class that mentioned the English Civil War either. I was well out of high school before I knew there actually had been one. I spent a couple of weeks in England when I was in college and specific Civil War events that had happened locally were mentioned by tour guides, but otherwise I’ve only heard of it through non-academic reading. To be honest, most of the little I do know about the English Civil War (Cromwell had a king executed?) is because it was fictionalized as part of the backstory to the Discworld novels. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/143 "2010-07-05T14:54:24Z")
American - we had NO world history in our curriculum. Two years of American History. From what I know about the world from my pre-college education, other nations do not exist unless we are in a war with them. We BARELY got through American History - in fact, I don’t think we managed to get farther than mentioning “Vietnam War” and “Watergate.” Of course, my high school was lousy. However, we did get an introduction to economics, political science, philosophy, psychology, sociology, and they DID teach us how to budget, balance a checkbook, and invest in the stock market. (I do have a History minor from college where I took no “traditional” American History.) ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/144 "2010-07-05T14:54:57Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > To throw out an anecdote, when I was about 11 years old I remember seeing the TV adaptation of _[Back Home](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Back_Home_%28novel%29)_. It’s about an English girl who was evacuated to the US during WWII, and by the time she comes home is quite Americanized and has a hard time readjusting to life in the UK. There’s a classroom scene where the teacher asks if anyone can explain the causes of the Civil War. The girl raises her hand and starts talking about slavery and state’s rights. She’s surprised and embarrassed when the teacher tells her they’re not discussing the _American_ Civil War. > > My (college educated and fairly intelligent) mother was sitting right there, so I asked her what the English Civil War was about. She said “They didn’t have one. They must be learning about the French Revolution.” :smack: > > I am now also a college educated adult myself, and can’t really blame my mother for her ignorance on this point because I’m pretty sure I never had a class that mentioned the English Civil War either. I was well out of high school before I knew there actually had been one. I spent a couple of weeks in England when I was in college and specific Civil War events that had happened locally were mentioned by tour guides, but otherwise I’ve only heard of it through non-academic reading. To be honest, most of the little I do know about the English Civil War (Cromwell had a king executed?) is because it was fictionalized as part of the backstory to the Discworld novels. How funny - I was going to include that TV minseries/book in my post too, only it was too long already. 😃 I do have the impression that most Americans learnt more about Britain than they did about other European countries - not that they learnt that much about any of them (due to the aforementioned problems with ‘too much history, too little time’), but that British history was taught slightly more than the others. This might well be observer bias. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/145 "2010-07-05T15:07:58Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > I certainly didn’t read them that way. > > I understand wanting to know how much other people learn about your own country… most people don’t hear much about Spain beyond “Columbus discovered America”; if they get more, it’s about points where we interacted directly. There’s more people who have heard of La Reconquista thanks to an old movie with Heston and Loren than to their History class, but the thing is, why would they? As enormously important as it is to us, and as much as it influenced the Conquista, it’s directly relevant to current world events only in the context of “Islam and Europe”. I understand Swedes for example don’t get any more, but then, the only time we were involved in the same war the main player was the French - why would they get more? I learned a bit more about Spanish history in Spanish language class (e.g., I remember a reading on the story of El Cid). ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/146 "2010-07-05T15:12:39Z")
> [@antonio107](#): > > Ontarian here. Yes, I learned about how Laura Secord ran barefoot down a dirt road to save some place that’s name eludes me from the Americans. We captured one of their Generals named “Hull,” and then we took Detroit and Maine by force. > > What always interested me is how the American Revolutionary war (which, for all intents and purposes, created the bulk of English Canada through fleeing loyalists), got so comparatively little coverage in our text books. Then we had a little section about confederate bank robbers in Canada during the Civil War. A half paragraph about Canadian soldiers in Korea. > > **And then an entire chapter devoted to Canada’s biggest bravest and most glorious war ever: the Boer War.** :smack: Just goes to show how varied history teaching is. I’m an Ontarian, 42 years old, and we barely learned about the existence of the Boer War. [The American Revolution was covered, though not in great depth; there was some mention in passing about the importance of the fleeing United Empire Loyalists] We had a section on the Riel Rebellion, and did a fun historical-type recreation of the Family Compact vs. William Lyon Mackenzie as a sort of role-playing game. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/147 "2010-07-05T16:27:58Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > …most people don’t hear much about Spain beyond “Columbus discovered America” What we learned about Spain as children mostly related to its explorers and conquistadors in America: Columbus, of course, De Soto, Balboa, Cortez and Pizarro. And then we learned a bit about Spanish Florida. We covered the Cuban War (Spanish American War) only lightly, and the lesson to be taken from that war was how easily slanted news reporting could lead the US into conflict. It is viewed as a cautionary tale on the perils of [Yellow Journalism](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_journalism). We learned nothing about the Reconquista. ---
**Author:** ![amanset](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8dc957/32.png) [@amanset](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amanset)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/148 "2010-07-05T16:40:15Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > My (college educated and fairly intelligent) mother was sitting right there, so I asked her what the English Civil War was about. She said “They didn’t have one. They must be learning about the French Revolution.” :smack: > > I am now also a college educated adult myself, and can’t really blame my mother for her ignorance on this point because I’m pretty sure I never had a class that mentioned the English Civil War either. I was well out of high school before I knew there actually had been one. I spent a couple of weeks in England when I was in college and specific Civil War events that had happened locally were mentioned by tour guides, but otherwise I’ve only heard of it through non-academic reading. To be honest, most of the little I do know about the English Civil War (Cromwell had a king executed?) is because it was fictionalized as part of the backstory to the Discworld novels. Hell, I’m a Brit with a postgraduate degree (not in history), so I guess you could call me educated, and I couldn’t tell you what the English Civil War was all about beyond Cromwell wanting to get rid of the monarchy and actually managing it for a short amount of time. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/149 "2010-07-05T17:20:45Z")
> [@scifisam2009](#): > > I do have the impression that most Americans learnt more about Britain than they did about other European countries - not that they learnt that much about any of them (due to the aforementioned problems with ‘too much history, too little time’), but that British history was taught slightly more than the others. This might well be observer bias. The very little we learned about British history may well have been more than we learned about anyplace else in Europe, at least if you’re talking about the past 1,000 years or so. I remember covering Ancient Greece and Rome in middle school, though. I’m perhaps not the best person to talk about the typical American high schools, because at the end of my freshman year I transferred to a special program with a unique curriculum. We had a wide variety of social studies classes available to us, and many were not about history at all but rather current events, politics, or social science. But I’ve just pulled up the list of required courses at my first high school on its website, and it’s pretty much as I remember it. As freshmen (9th graders) we were required to take a full year of American history. This picked up where the year of American history required in the 8th grade left off. For sophomores (10th grade) there’s a full year of world history, then juniors (11th grade) do semester of American history/current events and a semester of economics. Taking these courses is all you need to do to meet the graduation requirements in social studies. A few other courses about ancient history, European history, etc., are available as electives. Although requirements will vary from district to district, I think this is fairly typical. FWIW this particular district is considered a very good one, consistently ranked as one of the top 10 in the US. It would be possible for a student today to graduate from this high school without studying any European history except what was mentioned in American history or included in the required world history class. Looking at the course description, world history starts with the Stone Age and covers all of human history up to the present day, so I doubt they’re going into a lot of depth about anything. IIRC at the time I was in school then 10th graders were required to take a semester-long class called “Russia and China” and then a semester of some other world history. Since I changed schools I never had this class, but I guess it was meant to teach us about the major Communist powers. This was several years after the end of the Cold War and sounded pretty dated to me even at the time. I see now that the “Russia and China” class is not only no longer mandatory, it isn’t offered at all anymore. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/150 "2010-07-05T17:58:55Z")
IIRC my Ontaio history classes, each year covered various topics: One year was the history of the world in ancient times up to about 1700, although we really did not cover it in a lot o detail. I think the emphasis was things like “cradle of civilization” and the Nile, Greek and Roman expansion, the dark ages and germanic invasions, etc. Opportunities to do projects about pyramids and mummies. One year was the whole “settlement of British North America” (aka Canada). Too many French explorers to remember them all. One year was the rest of North America, and some brief mention of Simon Bolivar and South America. The biggest deal was the number of diffeent explorers of the various parts of the Americas, from the Conquistadors to Balboa and then into the expansion of the Americas - the Louisiana purchase, the revolution, etc. One year was Canada from the British conquest of the French up to Confederation and the CPR. When you hear about the war of 1812, it seems the Canadians won, ha ha. ABout the Revolution, OTOH, when you read the actual declaration of independence, it mentions a lot more about struggles between the governors/king and legislatures over who enacted and enforced laws, while my history class seemed to basically mention taxation without representation and billeting troops as the two main causes. Canadians (or at least Ontario) seemed to mention a lot more about “manifest destiny” and the fear that the Americans would march in and take the colonies if we didn’t defend ouselves. The confedration of the Canadian colonies, the building of the CPR railroad to assert ownership, the mounties (North-West Moutned Police) were all taken to ensure British sovereignity was asserted. I suppose the local politicians had the example of Texas to spur them on to prevent American encroachment. The lesson I recall about the Ontario and Quebec rebellions of 1837 was that after the American Revolution the British government felt that being too lax about local government was a mistake, and they actually clamped down on the remaining colonies a lot harder. It took the 1837 action to make them realize that evolving real self-government was the best way to prevent a repeat. Anything too recent or controversial was usually left off the curriculum to avoid inciting political fights - usually history ended with 1900, especially local history. Even Loius Riel is still controversial. Basically he was a schizo demagogue who made the serious mistake of deciding he had the authority to execute British citizens. That pretty much ended any chance of a negotiated settlement of Metis grievances. However, it does give rise to the interesting trivia that the last naval battle in Canada was in the middle of the prairies, whne the Metis ambushed a steamboat. ---
**Author:** ![Procrustus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/procrustus/32/2994_2.png) [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/151 "2010-07-05T18:18:19Z")
Michael Medved (some kind of right wing disc radio guy who also reviews films) said last week that the American Revolution was the most important event in the world in the last 500 years. Yep, that’s what he said. ---
**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 5, 2010, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/152 "2010-07-05T19:47:52Z")
> [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](#): > > How is that a minimal education? How can you expect to teach a subject like the Tudors or Roman occupation of the British isles in anything less than a complete term of history lessons, at least? The Tudor period saw the rise of England as a world power. Teaching that for an entire semster would be college-level depth, or your teachers were exceedingly lazy. Neither period was all that long, even as a chunk of British history. Sorry, this is so late. I don’t post as often these days. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/153 "2010-07-05T20:07:00Z")
> [@Procrustus](#): > > Michael Medved (some kind of right wing disc radio guy who also reviews films) said last week that the American Revolution was the most important event in the world in the last 500 years. Yep, that’s what he said. I wouldn’t say that it’s the most important, but I’d say it deserves a spot in the top 10. Other contenders off the top of my head: The French Revolution and the rise of Napoleon The Protestant Reformation (including the rise of Protestant England) (though this was more of a process than an “event”) The Industrial Revolution (also arguably more of a “process” than a discrete event) The Russian Revolution World War I World War II The conquest of Latin America by Spain and Portugal (and the ensuing decimation of Native Americans by European disease) (again, arguably a process rather than an event) The publication of _On the Origin of Species_ The development of nuclear weapons The invention of the internal combustion engine And I’m sure a dozen others I am forgetting, and others I am omitting because they just don’t make the cut (the Engish Civil War, the American Civil War, the birth of Israel, the end of the Raj and partition of India, the rise of Frederick the Great, the rise of Chairman Mao, moon landing, etc.) There are a lot of things that could be added to the list that are really processes more than events, such as the development of the scientific method, the harnessing of electricity, the development of computers and the internet, and the rise of colonialism (including the development of the British Raj in India). At the risk of being an arrogant jingoist 😉 , the American Revolution deserves a spot on the list, on a couple of grounds: 1. As noted above, the US revolutionaries were the first ones to put into practice the Enlightenment principles that much of the world now takes for granted. (Most particularly government by consent of the governed, but also the establishment of essential human rights with regard to life, liberty and property.) To begrudge the US its contribution to democratic rule and human rights in the world just seems like stubborn anti-Americanism to me. 2. Like it or not, the US is the world’s superpower, so its birth as a nation is of considerable world import on that ground alone. Whether or not you would agree that the American Revolution belongs at the _top_ of the list, it is hardly grounds for astonishment that _someone_ thinks so. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![WotNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e19b73/32.png) [@WotNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WotNot)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/154 "2010-07-05T20:20:37Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > Teaching that for an entire semster would be college-level depth, or your teachers were exceedingly lazy. Neither period was all that long, even as a chunk of British history. A British school term isn’t a semester – it’s either a third or (in some places these days) a sixth of a year. The Tudor period takes in the renaissance, the reformation and the beginnings of empire, to name only a the most obvious topics. And the Roman occupation of Britain was around 400 years – almost the same as the period of time now since the founding of the Jamestown colony, for instance. Whether that’s a long period or not depends on your point of view, I suppose. 😉 > [@Procrustus](#): > > Michael Medved (some kind of right wing disc radio guy who also reviews films) said last week that the American Revolution was the most important event in the world in the last 500 years. Yep, that’s what he said. I hate to make assumptions about someone of whom I know as little as I do of Mr Medved, but I’m hovering on the brink of inferring a degree of partiality on his part. ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/155 "2010-07-05T20:28:40Z")
On a similar note, I visited Yuanming Yuan in Beijing, and my wife was astounded that I had never heard of the [Eight Nation Army](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight-Nation_Alliance)’s attack on China. I wonder how many Americans learn in history class that their soldiers (and others) invaded China in 1900. Certainly every Chinese student learns it! ---
**Author:** ![antonio107](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/7ea924/32.png) [@antonio107](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/antonio107)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/156 "2010-07-05T20:35:57Z")
> [@Sunspace](#): > > Maybe the emphasis on the War of 1812 _is_ an Ontarian thing, though. Given the number of towns/streets/colleges/etc that are named after people and events in that war (Brock Road, Brock Street, Brockville, Loyalist College, etc), and actual battlefield locations that are within easy distance of where I grew up (Old Fort York, Lundy’s Lane, Crysler’s Farm, Queenston Heights, etc), that makes sense.I don’t remember hearing much about the Boer War when I was in school… I was very surprised to find a [prominent memorial](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_African_War_Memorial_%28Toronto%29) to it in the middle of University Avenue in Toronto. I think that is an example of just of far the mentality of Ontario has changed… even during my father’s childhood (1930’s), it was all For King and Empire. I’ve seen his school books. > > Apparently, fifty years ago, the Orange Order parade was one of the largest in Toronto… these days, I suspect most Torontonians have never heard of the Orange Order, or could say what it stood for, let alone known the importance it once had. There’s apparently still a parade, but it’s a few hundred people and they don’t bother to block the street off for it. There _is_ an Orange Order hall on Yonge Street, but it’s overshadowed by a Chinese retirement home. > > I don’t remember much of the history I took; I picked up most of my knowledge later. When I was in grade 10 (1977-78), though, I chose “History of Revolutions” with Mr. Esler rather than boring old Canadian history. History of Revolutions was cool. We looked at the factors which lead to a revolution. There were ten signs that revolution was likely, and I wish I could remember what they were, other than that #4 was ‘sustained mockery of the establishment’. > > We studied the October Crisis, watching the film [Action](http://www.onf-nfb.gc.ca/eng/collection/film/?id=10471). We studied the French Revolution, the Russian Revolution, the Chinese Revolution, and the American Revolution. We were studying Rasputin and the Tsar when that Boney M song “Rah Rah Rasputin” came out, and I was ecstatic: a history course was actually reflected in events in the real world around me! This was reinforced by studying the Chinese Revolution (Sun Yat Sen, the Kuomintang, the Long March, Norman Bethune, etc) when the Gang of Four was in power. _History was happening before our eyes!_ I think I might have quoted the wrong post, but I am on my blackberry, lol. I know that the Boer War had as much as it did in our textbook, because our history teacher openly pointed it out. He was opining that Canadians “forgot” about the Korean war, and showed the large disparity (1 paragraph vs. 1 chapter) as his proof. ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2010, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/157 "2010-07-05T23:00:08Z")
> [@antonio107](#): > > I know that the Boer War had as much as it did in our textbook, because our history teacher openly pointed it out. He was opining that Canadians “forgot” about the Korean war, and showed the large disparity (1 paragraph vs. 1 chapter) as his proof. All I remember is that Laurier was in a bind because English Canadians favoured conscription and French Canadians were opposed. ---
**Author:** ![antonio107](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/7ea924/32.png) [@antonio107](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/antonio107)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/158 "2010-07-06T01:40:18Z")
> [@hogarth](#): > > All I remember is that Laurier was in a bind because English Canadians favoured conscription and French Canadians were opposed. That’s all I _retained_, but our particular textbook went into their deployment, and talked at length about the Afrikaans people, and the different campaigns Canadians fought in. Oh, that and some battleship Laurier built called “The Rainbow” or something terribly effeminate like that. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![robby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robby/32/11048_2.png) [@robby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robby)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/159 "2010-07-06T03:09:10Z")
> [@Throatwarbler\_Mangrove](#): > > Many Americans labor under the mistaken notion that the American colonial insurgents defeated a major superpower, like their were the Zulus of the 1700s. Britain wasn’t a major superpower in the 1700s, it wasn’t even a “nation state” in the sense that it is today. The King of England at the time was a German who didn’t even speak English and who sent his own German troops to fight in the New World. The American colonies gained their independence largely due to the assistance of France, which WAS a major European power, even a superpower, perhaps. First off, there was no King of England at the time of the American Revolution, with the Kingdoms of England and Scotland having merged to form the united Kingdom of Great Britain with the Acts of Union in 1707. Next, Great Britain was a much a “nation state” then as it today–surely you’re not suggesting that the feudal system was still in effect! Next, as has been mentioned previously, King George III was a native English speaker. Finally, at the time of the American Revolution, Great Britain was indeed one of the most powerful nations on the planet. Few other nations at the time (or today, for that matter) could fight a war across the Atlantic on the shores of another continent. France’s assistance was invaluable, of course, particularly to help even the odds against Britain’s naval superiority. Both Great Britain and France were considered to be “great powers,” with the time of the so-called “superpowers” some centuries in the future. ---
**Author:** ![robby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robby/32/11048_2.png) [@robby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robby)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456/160 "2010-07-06T03:54:14Z")
All in all, I guess I am somewhat surprised at the evident lack of coverage of the American Revolution. Because it is covered in such excruciating detail in the U.S., you Brits might forgive us for assuming that it would at least be mentioned. In any event, I do indeed think that the American Revolution is significant beyond its importance to Americans–the American Revolution was also an important event in the history of democracy. The U.S. was the first modern democratic state, and its establishment led the way away from the monarchies common in 1776 to the democracies common today. As for what history I was taught in school, I moved around a lot as a child, so I managed to get California state history, Texas state history, and Tennessee state history, along with “social studies” every year. Social studies included both basic U.S. history as well as world history. For the latter, we learned about Mesopotamia and the Fertile Crescent, ancient Egypt, the ancient Greeks and Romans, etc. In high school, I got much more in-depth history courses. I took both AP (Advanced Placement) U.S. History, as well as AP European History, and got university credit for both. Finally, I’ve always been interested in British history in general, especially that history prior to the American Revolution, thinking of it as being _my_ history before the establishment of the U.S. I’ve read a great deal of history after graduating from college, including British history. Looking through the curriculum linked earlier, I’m pretty familiar with all of the topics listed–from the Norman Conquest to the Tudors to the English Civil War to the Glorious Revolution. I think it’s pretty safe to say that most Americans know little or nothing about the latter two. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/from-what-perspective-is-the-american-revolutionary-war-taught-to-british-schoolchildren/545456.md?page=9)