To what extent do Americans consider British history part of theirs?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Observing from a non-Anglo-Saxon perspective, it seems to me that events or people from British history feature quite prominently in American educational curricula and the canon of what is considered general knowledge. This surely applies to literature (e.g. Chaucer, Shakespeare) and legal/constitutional history (e.g. Magna Carta), perhaps to a lesser but still discernible extent to general history (say, for instance, the Battle of Hastings).

So is there, still in the 21st century, an underlying feeling in the American collective awareness that, because of the country being a former British colony that gained independence, pre-1776 British history is part of American history and to be studied as such?

2

For the average American who’s formal study of history ended in high school, I would say . . . not really. “American History” as taught in most schools is limited to events in British North America and then the United States, with just enough context of British history and governance for those events to make sense. For instance, most Americans could tell you that the colonists suffered from “taxation without representation.” But if you asked them why they were being taxed (i.e. to help cover the costs of British troops stationed in the colonies since the French and Indian War) they would stare at you blankly.

In most curricula I’m familiar with, the events you name (Magna Carta, Hastings) would fall squarely under “European History.” Of course, those who take more advanced history courses in college or even honors curricula in high schools will make those connections. But you’re talking about a minority of Americans.

3

And of course for those a bit older the European History courses were called World History as the history of non-European civilizations was given limited coverage.

4

As an American who took history in high school, and I think one semester in college, I would say “not at all”. It’s British history, not American history.

I learned about the Tudors, Magna Carta, etc., but not as a part of American history.

5

Perhaps the more interesting and visceral question is whether Americans consider British culture to be part of theirs, and the answer is a resounding “no”. In fact, Americans have made concerted efforts to distance themselves from it. One example was Noah Webster’s successful effort to simplify and Americanize British spelling (in words like color vs colour) to accentuate not just political but also cultural separation from all things British.

Another interesting example is found in architecture. If you look at the architecture in Canada of, say, the Parliament buildings, they very much follow British historical traditions. The US of course rejected that tradition, and, searching for an alternative, often settled on the architecture of ancient Greece as the inspiration, not just for its intrinsic beauty but for its association with the founding of democracy. Which is why, for instance, the Supreme Court building looks like a Greek temple.

6

IMO … As @flurb said.

When I was taking history in school 50-ish years ago, “American history” began about when the Mayflower group arrived in North America, fast forwarded to the leadup to the Revolution, the Continental Congress, etc. as prelude, then really got underway once the USA existed under the present Constitution.

Like most geezers, I have to assume history as taught nowadays includes more stuff from more recently and therefore even less stuff from the far past. To US eyes, “far past” being more like 100 years than 1,000 years as a European might interpret the term.

7

Did you learn about the Bourbons and the Habsburgs as much as you learned about the Tudors?

8

My US history class had a tiny bit about Spanish conquistadors before settling into the thirteen colonies. We certainly never touched anything like the battle of Hastings.

Literature classes in the US do tend to focus heavily on literature written in English. I think the reasons for that are obvious:

  1. we can’t read it directly
  2. there’s enough of it that there’s not a compelling reason to seek it other literature.

I did read some translated stuff in high school “English” classes, but i don’t think it’s odd that English-language literature was over-represented.

9

Yes.
.

10

I would say the Habsburgs yes, but the Bourbons don’t ring a bell.

11

I can’t speak for @RitterSport, but in my experience “European History” as taught in American high schools is probably 50% British history, 30% French history, 10% German history and then everyone else kind of on the margins.

12

British history is…British history, not American. It falls into the realm of a lot of history that had a substantial impact on development of the United States, including the French revolution and Irish potato famine. Certainly American law evolved from British forms.* But we don’t celebrate 1066 and all that.

Sherlock Holmes had it exactly wrong. From “The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor”:

“…I am one of those who believe that the folly of a monarch and the blundering of a minister in far-gone years will not prevent our children from being some day citizens of the same world-wide country under a flag which shall be a quartering of the Union Jack with the Stars and Stripes.”

*if we could dump the word coroner and the messes that flow from the concept we’d be better off. Maybe eliminate sheriffs too.

13

Exactly - I’ve found that Americans know a lot more about English history than they do about that of any other part of Europe. That shows, to me, that the OP is not that far off the mark.

14

Fine, but we don’t consider it part of American history, which is what the question was.

15

Yup, that’s England’s history, not ours. We know about the early English settlers here, and a little bit about the Spanish settlers, nearly nothing about other Europeans settlers, nothing at all about Russian settlers in Alaska, nothing about settlers from Asia, next to nothing about the people who were here for millennia before everybody else showed up, but we know real history started in 1776 when Ben Franklin fought the Russians in the South Pacific so we could celebrate Fireworks Day on July 4th. We teach history good.

16

From what I recall the Spanish, French and British involvement in American history was mostly to show how they got it wrong. They were evil empires that enslaved the people of the Americas in order to enrich themselves and treated the Europeans that settled here as second class citizens who only choice was to revolt and correct their wrongs.

It still shows up in modern society as an opposition to any European ideas by a large amount of the American population. Even when those ideas make perfect sense when considered on there own merits, like universal healthcare. Even things like roundabouts get sneared at from rural Americans because they are perceived as European, even though they have been proven to work better than four way stops in many instances.

17

My daughter is currently taking World History II, having taken World History I in middle school. Thanks to COVID remote/hybrid/in-person but no study groups, I had a front row seat.

World History I was 75% European History with the remaining 25% heavily focused on the Middle East. China, Japan, India barely rated a whole week. For example my daughter can tell you all about the feudal system in Medieval Europe, but not anything about socio-economic structure of any other area.

World History II had quite a bit about the age of exploration, but remarkably little about the kingdoms, empires, cultures and societies that colonial powers ran roughshod over. The Malian empire for example gets literally one paragraph, and the Abbasids not much more. The whole Ottoman Empire only turns up as a bit player in the Crusades and then to get smashed in World War I.

My daughter can tell you loads about Calvinism, Methodism, CoE, Lutheranism, Presbyterianism, Anabaptists, etc. etc. but cannot tell you anything about Sunni and Shia Islam.

18

As a former school board member (over 10+ years ago now) that has reviewed textbooks in the last 10-20 year span of time, firstly I will say, at least in Virginia, many of the things people are saying either aren’t known or aren’t taught are actually taught and in the textbooks. I would agree that they probably aren’t well known, because I think normal human retention of history taught in K-12 is low, with a lot of people just remembering enough to pass each unit’s test and move on to the next thing, forgetting it by the next school year let alone ten years after graduation.

In my experience it would be unusual for a school system to teach as much about the Bourbons and the Habsburgs. There is typically a decent focus on the reign of Elizabeth I (the final Tudor monarch) in both history and English courses–English classes actually teach a lot of English history in the United States. This may seem strange, but it is often done in the context of understanding our evolution of language. For this reason it is very common for American English textbooks to discuss the Norman conquest because of how it affects the linguistic history of the English language, and to then discuss things like the vowel shift, Middle English, Chaucer, then early modern English the Elizabethan era is discussed because it is the time of Shakespeare who is usually a major unit of study at multiple steps throughout a typical K-12 education.

Now, what I will say is it is not to my knowledge common to present pre-colonial English/British history as part of “American history.” However, it is common for some of it to seep into American-history focused courses.

In Virginia when I was involved in education we had learning standards for:

  • American history up to 1865
  • American history from 1865 to Present (this functionally often covers only up through the 1980s or so)
  • Virginia History
  • U.S. Government & Virginia Government

In American history up to 1865, there was an expectation students learn at least somewhat about pre-Columbian history (which was a change from when I was a student), which meant several units on what we know about pre-contact Native American civilizations. There would then typically be units on colonial America, which usually cover at least some degree of English history “as it overlaps”, this will include specific historical or political developments in England/Great Britain that had an impact on colonization.

In Virginia history, as one of the original thirteen colonies, there is a focus on Native American tribes in the area of the modern day Commonwealth, probably even a little more focus on reasons for English colonization and some of the profit-seeking motives of the early exploration “companies” behind early Virginia settlement.

In U.S. Government & Virginia Government, there is a good amount of coverage of things like the English Bill of Rights, John Locke, probably a brief mention of Magna Carta, the conception of the common law legal system etc.

World History to 1500, another standard in Virginia, mostly does not cover much English history for a number of reasons–I believe in the past it did more so.

Overall while I think it is correct to say at least in Virginia we don’t teach English history as “American history”, the history of England has bleed over in the English curriculum, civics/government curriculum, the early American history curriculum, and also probably for any State that was originally a colony, the State history curriculum. While I cannot speak for all fifty states, I believe most have an entire year devoted to the history of the local State.

19

We get PBS weepies about Anne Boleyn and Marie Antoinette getting their heads cut off, so that covers the Tudors, Bourbons and Hapsburgs for the average American.

20

In California, there is a focus on California History in 4th Grade so I’d wager that the average elementary school student here knows more about Spanish History than British History. We build Spanish missions out of sugar cubes; not Big Ben or Stonehenge.