How is the American War for Independance taught in the UK?

[coolicus]

It wasn't really covered in high school - History is shockingly compressed here in the UK I think we spent less than 6 hours on WW2.

I do wish some you yanks would learn to call us Britain or the United Kingdom and not England though - England has not existed as a separate entity since the act of union in 1703.

I'm curious as to how much the key involvement of the French is taught? I don't think the revolutionaries would of been victorious were it not for the aid given to them by the French. Although the whole debt of gratitude seems to be forgotten in the states now :/?

 

[A Raging Emo]

It's not; as far as I've experienced, we've only been taught British History. When I was in School, we covered the time that the British Empire spent in the Americas, but that was only a small topic.

We focused more on British Crime and Punishment during the ages, and Germany and Europe between 1914 and 1945, which included Hitler's rise to power and social and economic changes.

 

[Ranorak]

William van Oranje (Dunno if that was spelt right)

You did.

OT: As a dutchy, we our selves had a fair share of colonies.
And as I recall, we didn't learn much about their independence.
Well, maybe a bit about Indonesia. But that's mostly because there IS a lot of talk about the VOC (Dutch East India Company)

...then again... "It was the first multinational corporation in the world and the first company to issue stock. It was also arguably the world's first megacorporation, possessing quasi-governmental powers, including the ability to wage war, imprison and execute convicts, negotiate treaties, coin money, and establish colonies."

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

A rag-tag band of revolutionaries from a 150 year old set of sparsely populated colonies beat a global, highly-developed empire.

That's not even close to the truth.

May I suggest this book: http://www.amazon.com/What-Ifs-American-History-Historians/dp/0399150919 : where Historians look into the real history of the time and postulate on how little changes would mean that America would be saying "Gorr Lumey, me duck, apples and pears".

Equally, turning points like the Cuban Missile Crisis, Hollywood and Watergate.

It would be fair to say that "a rag-tag band of squabbling infighters managed to harass and ambush a starved, stranded Empire while it was being attacked from all sides to a point where it was inefficient to carry on fighting."

 

[goldenelite0]

Not very well, it's more a thing we acknowledge rather than study.

It's not, sadly. This and the American civil war are two of my favourite subjects (as a brit)

But don't worry, it's not just the revolution and 1812 we don't learn about. We don't even get taught about any British wars or even the British Empire at all really. School will dip a little into WW1 and WW2 but it's taken from the view that 'war is bad' and history lessons normally focus on social aspects. Schools just don't do war.

However you can take degrees at Uni that will teach you this stuff. I am doing international politics this year and we're going to learn about warfare after waterloo, american civil war, vietnam... etc. I'm really looking forward to it.

 

[deathninja]

Was never taught at any of the schools I was at.

Primary was Egypt, Romans and WW2.
Secondary was 1066, Tudors and Mughals.
GCSE was persecution of the Amish, Persecution of Blacks and persecution of the Jews.

Hell, hardly any of it was even British history.

 

[ultimateownage]

It's not.

We learn about important things, like World War 1&2, The Cold War (and Cuba, Vietnam, and Korea) and in year 7/ 8 we learn about Neanderthal and similar stuff.
You know, stuff that matters to more than just one country.

*EDIT* Oh, and slavery and race issues.

 

[RiboNucleicAxe]

It seems that our history lessons only cover things that suit us.

Advances in medical history? Check. The wars we won? Check.
The wars that other people lost? Check.
The times things went wrong for us? No dice.

 

[Vanguard_Ex]

It isn't.

I've noticed the American education system takes great pride in American history and as such a lot of the teaching centres around that. British history curriculum, on the other hand, deals with more recent (from a historical standpoint) events, such as the Cold War and WW2. Which is a shame, because I got so fucking sick of hearing about the god damn nazis.

 

[fates_puppet13]

I've wondered this before. I also wonder how World War 2 and the Holocaust are covered in Germany.

in 2 ways

carefully
and also in a "this is our countrt's biggest mistake ever" way

 

[Basal]

William van Oranje (Dunno if that was spelt right)

You did.

OT: As a dutchy, we our selves had a fair share of colonies.
And as I recall, we didn't learn much about their independence.
Well, maybe a bit about Indonesia. But that's mostly because there IS a lot of talk about the VOC (Dutch East India Company)

the first multinational corporation in the world and the first company to issue stock. It was als...then again... "It waso arguably the world's first megacorporation, possessing quasi-governmental powers, including the ability to wage war, imprison and execute convicts, negotiate treaties, coin money, and establish colonies."

That's because we didn't loose most of our colonies to independence but to other powers who took them away from us. We have had only 2 colonies declare independence and those were Indonesia and Surinam.

What I'm interested is how the Glorius Revolution is covered in English history class, are they thought it was a british affair and do they forget the fact they were invadede by a dutch force of 400+ ships and over 40.000 troops.

 

[Airsoftslayer93]

its not taught, now back to revising for my history exam, fucking nazis, fucking holocaust, fucking war

 

[silver wolf009]

Well, I live in America, but my teacher did have a UK textbook, which taught it as the american rebellion. Kind of freaky to see something which you were always taught one way from the other side...