# How is the American Revolution taught in British schools? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 11, 2009, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047 "2009-05-11T16:28:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![MarcinCiez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b38774/32.png) [@MarcinCiez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MarcinCiez)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/81 "2009-05-13T02:52:31Z")
> [@Captain\_Carrot](#): > > If you didn’t mean “more powerful”, you shouldn’t have said “more powerful comparatively”. Shoul 'ave, Would 'ave, Could 'ave :smack: … So you wan’t me to say that you’re right in pointing that out??? FINE. 🆒 Like I said… I get in trouble with my mother-in-law (MIL).. at my wedding my religious MIL wanted to do a traditional prayer, I said “it will make me laugh”, it was supposed to mean, “I get uncomfortable with things like that and when I get uncomfortable I tend to giggle” … anyway.. she got really pissed off. So appologies, I will try harder in explaining what my mind means. Damn… it’s so easy to feel foolish in this forum. ---
**Author:** ![mutantmoose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a87d85/32.png) [@mutantmoose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mutantmoose)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/82 "2009-05-13T03:13:11Z")
You spelt apologies wrong ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/83 "2009-05-13T03:21:52Z")
> [@Mahaloth](#): > > I’m surprised to hear this. I have a lot of Canadian friend from all over Canada and most, if not all, told me they actually had one American History class in high school. > > Not true for you? I had an American History class, but it was an optional, chosen from a wide variety of social studies classes you could take. A course specifically in American history is not required for graduation in this province, but most decent high schools will offer one. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/84 "2009-05-13T04:31:00Z")
On the whole I agree with the others who are saying that it wasn’t taught much British history classes, and even at the time it was seen as a pretty minor issue compared to other stuff that Britain had going on at the time. Indeed, I suspect that if Britain had been bothered to deploy the full might of their military power against the American rebels, they could have been crushed quite easily. (No doubt many Americans will be quick tell me I am totally wrong about that.) Apart from history classes, however, Britain gets so much American entertainment (movies, TV, even books), that I suspect that most British people who learn about the American revolution largely from this, tend to see it largely from the American perspective. They might tend to block out any “British are evil” aspects of the storytelling, but they will still take on board the view of the revolutionaries as the good guys, fighting for freedom and all that. Having come from Britain to live in America, however, I have been struck by the fact that Americans always refer to it as the Revolution, whereas in Britain I always heard it referred to as the American War of Independence (never even anything like “rebellion,” which sounds like a revolution, but is less positive). The phrase “American War of Independence,” when I think about it, does not make much sense. From the British perspective I can see why one might say “War of American Independence” (i.e., the war we fought over the issue of American independence), but “American War of Independence” seems to mean a war the Americans fought over independence (which it was, of course, but if you are going to be looking at from the American perspective like this, why not just say "revolution like the Americans themselves do). Incidentally, on one of my first Fourth of Julys in America I was asked by an American friend, a very intelligent and well educated man, whether we celebrate the Fourth in Britain. I replied, “No, we do not consider the loss of the American colonies to be cause for celebration.” (I am rather proud of that.) Also, if the movie “The Madness of King George” is to be believed, George III did not actually go mad until long after the colonies had been lost. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/85 "2009-05-13T04:37:42Z")
> [@](#): > > With reference to Canada: > A course specifically in American history is not required for graduation in this province, but most decent high schools will offer one. Frankly, that makes Canada look a bit lame. Most countries have enough history of their own to teach, and if they do provide an option to study someone else’s, America’s will not automatically be first on the list. (Canada’s history before Canada is British and French history, surely.) ---
**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:** [May 13, 2009, 9:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/86 "2009-05-13T09:56:39Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > Also, if the movie “The Madness of King George” is to be believed, George III did not actually go mad until long after the colonies had been lost. This reminds me of a point I’ve long wanted to mention in regards to George III. Americans seem to hold him up as a significant political figure - the hate figure of the story, in fact. Yet he really doesn’t play any significant role in our education of the period in question. In political/decision-making terms, we talk about ‘the British Government’ or ‘Parliament’, as they were the decision makers. We’ve long seen the monarchs in this and subsequent periods as simply the sitting tenants which allow us to label periods as ‘georgian’, ‘regency’, ‘victorian’ etc. Perhaps Americans have focussed on George as a symbol of overthrowing a monarchy. He just doesn’t figure as a major figure in our history. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 10:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/87 "2009-05-13T10:29:42Z")
> [@SanVito](#): > > Tudors (LOADS on this) How come everyone studies the Tudors, but never the Fordors? > [@njtt](#): > > Incidentally, on one of my first Fourth of Julys in America I was asked by an American friend, a very intelligent and well educated man, whether we celebrate the Fourth in Britain. I replied, “No, we do not consider the loss of the American colonies to be cause for celebration.” (I am rather proud of that.) Or you could just say “Yes, we call it Good Riddance Day” if you’re feeling like taking the piss (as you Britons so quaintly put it). > [@Really Not All That Bright](#): > > I distinctly remember the look on people’s faces on the first day of (US college) American History when the professor informed the class that the Pilgrims came to America not in search of religious freedom, but in search of a place where they could be intolerant too. They were misnamed too. Pilgrims are people who make trips to visit holy sites. There weren’t any holy sites in the New World at that time. Or at least no Christian holy sites. If they’d been called by a more appropriate name, such as Separatists (people who wanted to separate themselves from the evil influences of any and everyone else’s religious thinking), then there wouldn’t be so much misunderstanding about them. But really, they shouldn’t even be studied in American history. They were actually very unimportant to everything that came later. ---
**Author:** ![mutantmoose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a87d85/32.png) [@mutantmoose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mutantmoose)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/88 "2009-05-13T13:30:59Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > Incidentally, on one of my first Fourth of Julys in America I was asked by an American friend, a very intelligent and well educated man, whether we celebrate the Fourth in Britain. I replied, “No, we do not consider the loss of the American colonies to be cause for celebration.” (I am rather proud of that.) If we had a national holiday for _every_ country that gained independence from Britain we’d never get any work done. > [@SanVito](#): > > This reminds me of a point I’ve long wanted to mention in regards to George III. Americans seem to hold him up as a significant political figure - the hate figure of the story, in fact. It’s unfair on George to portray him as a hate figure. From [wikipedia:](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_iii) > [@](#): > > in the words of Professor Peter Thomas, George’s “hopes were centred on a political solution, and he always bowed to his cabinet’s opinions even when sceptical of their success. The detailed evidence of the years from 1763 to 1775 tends to exonerate George III from any real responsibility for the American Revolution.” Though the Americans characterised George as a tyrant, in these years he acted as a constitutional monarch supporting the initiatives of his ministers One thing the movie did get right was George’s attitude once independence became a reality. George was quite chilled about it: > [@](#): > > When John Adams was appointed American Minister to Britain in 1785, George had become resigned to the new relationship between his country and the States. He told Adams, “I was the last to consent to the separation; but the separation having been made and having become inevitable, I have always said, as I say now, that I would be the first to meet the friendship of the United States as an independent power.” ---
**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:** [May 13, 2009, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/89 "2009-05-13T13:40:20Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > Apart from history classes, however, Britain gets so much American entertainment (movies, TV, even books), that I suspect that most British people who learn about the American revolution largely from this, tend to see it largely from the American perspective. They might tend to block out any “British are evil” aspects of the storytelling, but they will still take on board the view of the revolutionaries as the good guys, fighting for freedom and all that. Funny story: I moved to the US in 1996, and entered the 10th grade. I took World History that year. In 11th grade, the guidance counselor made me sign up for Honors American History (equivalent to the top stream, for non-Americans reading this) despite my protestations that I didn’t know anything about American history and would fail miserably if I was thrown in at the deep end. Anyway, on the first day, the instructor gave us a 30-question test to see how much we already knew. You may have guessed the punchline already: I got the highest score (25/30). Nearly everything I got correct (such as “who shot Lincoln?”) I had learned from _The Simpsons_. > [@](#): > > Incidentally, on one of my first Fourth of Julys in America I was asked by an American friend, a very intelligent and well educated man, whether we celebrate the Fourth in Britain. I replied, “No, we do not consider the loss of the American colonies to be cause for celebration.” (I am rather proud of that.) To this day, people often ask me if I “celebrated the Fourth of July in England.” To which I always replied, “No, our calendar goes from the third of July to the fifth. There is no fourth.” > [@dtilque](#): > > How come everyone studies the Tudors, but never the Fordors? Was that a _Mafia_ joke? Bravo, sir. ---
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/90 "2009-05-13T14:15:20Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > Frankly, that makes Canada look a bit lame. Most countries have enough history of their own to teach, and if they do provide an option to study someone else’s, America’s will not automatically be first on the list. (Canada’s history before Canada is British and French history, surely.) When I was in high school (in the 1970s, as I stated in a post above), a course in British history was required. Starting with the Norman Conquest and moving up to the Industrial Revolution, we studied British history. I don’t know if it is still required thirty years later, however. I can see where American history would make a good elective choice for Canadian schools. Our histories do intertwine and it could be helpful for Canadian students to understand the American point of view on historical issues that touched us both. I disagree that American history should be a mandatory course for Canadian students, though. ---
**Author:** ![villa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/bc79bd/32.png) [@villa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/villa)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/91 "2009-05-13T14:39:07Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > Incidentally, on one of my first Fourth of Julys in America I was asked by an American friend, a very intelligent and well educated man, whether we celebrate the Fourth in Britain. I replied, “No, we do not consider the loss of the American colonies to be cause for celebration.” (I am rather proud of that.) I always tell my friends that we do. When they ask why, I suggest it is the day the average IQ of the British Empire jumped 10 points. ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/92 "2009-05-13T14:53:30Z")
In the 1970s I seem to recall that we crawled up as far as the late sixteenth century, and leaped up to the twentieth century, because that was what the ‘O’ Level examination syllabus was going to be about. All that in between was simply dumped. And in retrospect the teaching that we did get was inadequate even for its purpose. I had expected to sail through Part One of the History O Level (a multiple choice thing that involved you making pencil marks on a computer card so that the computer could mark it). But there were some questions that even I couldn’t answer and I did some hasty reading up about Weimar Germany before the second part (ended up with a ‘B’ grade, if anyone’s interested). God knows what the others made out of it all. ---
**Author:** ![villa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/bc79bd/32.png) [@villa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/villa)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/93 "2009-05-13T15:10:07Z")
I honestly can’t remember what we studied for O Level (1985 here). For A level, it got a lot more specialist - we did Medieval European (Charlemagne, the monasteries, the Investiture Contest and up to Frederick Barbarossa) and Modern English history (the Great Reform Act (1832) through 1914). The exam was much more general, of course, and you just had to study enough of a time period to be able to answer enough questions. You also did a chosen specialist area, which we did Weimar Germany, which was far more based on documentary evidence. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2009, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/94 "2009-05-15T04:40:07Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Was that a _Mafia_ joke? Bravo, sir. No, just a 2-door/4-door pun. ---
**Author:** ![BlinkingDuck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/eada6e/32.png) [@BlinkingDuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlinkingDuck)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2009, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/95 "2009-05-15T14:45:52Z")
> [@Speaker\_for\_the\_Dead](#): > > From a Canadian perspective, there wasn’t much on it in my education, either. Heck, there wasn’t a lot on the War of 1812, either, even though a lot of Canadians love to crow about their victory over the 'States. At least in my experience, the history we were tought was about discovery, exploration, and then a lot of social history regarding relations with the First Nations and within Canada itself. My senior History class, taught entirely on Canada, focused on the 20th century, and the birth of Canada as not only a legal nation, but as an identity and a world player during and after the World Wars. Canadians seem to love to crow about burning the Whiye House. I usually respond with “But we sure kicked your ass at New Orleans!” They will look at me like a dumb American and say that the New Orleans battle wasn’t faught by Canadians to which I will reply: “They were just as Canadian as the ones who burned the White House!”. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2009, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/96 "2009-05-15T15:14:25Z")
New Orleans was irrelevant to the outcome; fought after the war was over, but nobody knew it yet. If nothing else it proved, not for the last time, that even mediocre troops could fight well from behind prepared defences. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2009, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/97 "2009-05-15T21:46:51Z")
> [@](#): > > **mutantmoose** > One thing the movie did get right was George’s attitude once independence became a reality. George was quite chilled about it: Really? It is a long time since I saw the movie, but as I remember it George was depicted as being very bummed about having lost the American colonies. Indeed, I got the impression that it was meant to a significant factor in driving him crazy (along with the porphyria, of course). (I have no idea if that is historically realistic.) I have now got this little verse stuck in my head. I read it a long time ago in a (British published) book of comic verse. George the third Ought never to have occurred. One can only wonder At so grotesque a blunder. Probably very unfair, but still… ---
**Author:** ![The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3ec8ea/32.png) [@The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Great_Philosopher)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2009, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/98 "2009-05-15T21:55:59Z")
> [@Ellis\_Aponte\_Jr](#): > > I would think that, matters of patriotism aside, the circumstances of the birth of the world’s most powerful nation - and holder of that distinction for the last 60 years at the very least - would be an intrinsically worthwhile topic. I don’t see the step between the most powerful nation in the world for the last 60 years, and the importance of its birth hundreds of years ago. Given America status as the most powerful nation for the last 60 years, it’s worthwhile for British schoolkids to study those 60 years (which they do: they study the world wars, the cold war, the great depression sometimes, etc, with a major focus on America’s role in the world) and also perhaps to study how America came to be so powerful. But I don’t think the birth of the nation is particularly important for anyone not in the nation - it was a British colony, it rebelled and won a war against the colonists. It might well be ‘interesting’ to learn more about it than that but I guess it’s not seen as being as important to what British kids should know about history compared to other things. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2009, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/99 "2009-05-15T23:20:53Z")
> [@YogSosoth](#): > > I grew up in the US and know our side intimately as it has been drummed into my head from an early age. To sum up, a band of noble pilgrims seeking religious freedom made their way from England to the US to establish a new home. Pilgrims? Those Jamestown colonists (1607) were capitalists, not pilgrims! (Sorry. Pet peeve. English colonization didn’t begin in 1620 with the Pilgrims, though many seem to think so, for some reason.) ---
**Author:** ![Vlad\_Igor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/7feea3/32.png) [@Vlad\_Igor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Vlad_Igor)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2009, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047/100 "2009-05-16T01:40:44Z")
> [@GorillaMan](#): > > …understanding why countries become powerful is very different from placing a particular emphasis on the current holder of the greatest power just because it holds that status, prioritising the status quo and implicitly suggesting that the present will also be the future. Understanding why great powers emerged in the past, and also why they declined, is educational. Being told that America is powerful isn’t. Amidst all of the flag waving, Red, White and Blue cheering and atomic-bomb tipped missiles, we Americans tend to forget that we’re much younger than our ancestral countries. I used to think I was looking at something special when I drove through a neighborhood here with houses dating back to 1895-1905, or toured the House of Seven Gables in Salem, Massachussetts. Then I lived in Alsace, France for a year, and saw houses still in use dating back to the mid to late 1500s. It put my attitude in place and my view of the US in a more realistic context. More history occurred before 1776 than has occurred since then. > [@dtilque](#): > > No, just a 2-door/4-door pun. Let us not forget the famous Russian automotive pioneer: Fyodor Szedan. Vlad/Igor [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-the-american-revolution-taught-in-british-schools/496047.md?page=6)