History and Culture

[Fierce_LiNk]

The idea for this thread actually came about through an MSN conversation with Ine. For some reason, we were talking about the subject of History, and being taught History in school. When I thought back to my experiences and shared this with her, she was horrified to say the least.

 

I'm going to copy and paste a section of the National Curriculum Website, which details the breadth and content of each subject that should be taught in the classroom, including what children should be learning, skills they should develop, and so forth:

 

"British history

 

4. the development of political power from the Middle Ages to the twentieth century, including changes in the relationship between rulers and ruled over time, the changing relationship between the crown and parliament, and the development of democracy

5. the different histories and changing relationships through time of the peoples of England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales

6. the impact through time of the movement and settlement of diverse peoples to, from and within the British Isles

7. the way in which the lives, beliefs, ideas and attitudes of people in Britain have changed over time and the factors – such as technology, economic development, war, religion and culture – that have driven these changes

8. the development of trade, colonisation, industrialisation and technology, the British Empire and its impact on different people in Britain and overseas, pre-colonial civilisations, the nature and effects of the slave trade, and resistance and decolonisation

 

European and world history

 

9. the impact of significant political, social, cultural, religious, technological and/or economic developments and events on past European and world societies

10. the changing nature of conflict and cooperation between countries and peoples and its lasting impact on national, ethnic, racial, cultural or religious issues, including the nature and impact of the two world wars and the Holocaust, and the role of European and international institutions in resolving conflicts."

 

In pasting that, I have just remembered what started off this conversation. It was to do with a fact that was told on QI, which I did not know, and Ine wondered why I had not been told that in History. My answer: Well...we only ever really learned British History.

 

Thinking back to my experiences, and looking at the information I have just pasted, this is very, very strange. There is a lot of British History, and it takes an awful lot of time in teaching all of this. However...we have sacrificed teaching more about countries outside of our own.

 

With further discussion, I mentioned to Ine that sometimes I think Britain has a "superiority complex", and she definitely agreed. I've been thinking more about this since, and I just can't help but think about it. Why do we think this? Are we actually even that much better? Or are we in fact worse?

 

Walking through the streets of Newport, you can go miles without seeing a smile from anyone. There is very little to do here, very few places to go, and when you're unemployed, there are very few opportunities for jobs. Not only that, but there is no sense of identity, or a sense of being proud. When I think about topics of conversation that I have with family members, or programmes that I see on television, they are all very much focused about Britain (America, as well) and stuff that is taking place in this country.

 

My problem is why do I feel as if we are stuck in the corner, or not a part of the rest of the world. Sure, we see news broadcasts which show the goings-on in the rest of the World, but I find that not many people tend to care. Part of the beauty of being in Belgium or even France (Paris) was that you are in an entirely different country, with different values, tradition, language and identity. The family unit there seems tighter. It's very hard to describe what I'm trying to say, but it feels more "worldly", and it generally feels as if they are more connected and in tune with other cultures than we might be. At least how Newport is anyway.

 

I guess it is very late, so I'm sorry if this makes little sense or seems a bit crap. This makes sense in my head, but it's hard to put my feelings down in writing.

[Shino]

Those subjects aren't any different from what they teach here, except its about Portugal, although maybe we dig deeper into the international scene around the industrialization. Any previous knowledge we had, for example from Britain, was that there was some Saxons and Celts around there.

 

About the superiority complex of the British, yes there is a bit when comparing to other European countries.

[Aimless]

If the British weren't taught British history then no one would be.

 

It isn't so much a superiority complex as a feeling of isolation, I think. Geographically there is a clear separation between the UK and the rest of Europe, and having such fixed borders is a large psychological difference; for comparison Belgium borders on France, The Netherlands, Germany and Luxembourg.

 

On top of that we (mostly) speak English, so in that respect you could say our nearest cultural neighbours are on the other side of the globe. Drawing comparison to Belgium again, that country's population speaks French, Dutch and some German. On a related note a lot of the world's entertainment is put out in English, so outside of school most people aren't that exposed to other languages which exacerbates the divide.

 

I'm sure there are many citizens who think the UK is the last bastion of civilisation, but the same can be said for subsets of every other country. That's just people. Let's not pretend everyone in mainland Europe is an open-minded individual that's well versed in world history; that's as lazy and inaccurate as rolling out "Americans are stupid".

 

I've never been to Newport, but I'd hazard a guess that there's a huge difference between it and, say, London. The latter's something of a cultural melting pot whereas I can tell you that the population of Devon is orders of magnitude less diverse in terms of ethnicity. So you see even micro level geography can shape your outlook on the world as it affects what you're exposed to.

 

And it's exposure that makes the internet so great! Above me we have someone from Portugal responding to your question, and earlier you were talking to your Belgian girlfriend via this elaborate series of tubes. Geography holds no sway here, Flink, and as an adult you're free to go ahead a learn about whatever you like: rather than asking yourself why you didn't know that piece of history from QI, why not spend the time reading up on it instead? In truth you probably didn't really care about the information itself, more the idea that you were somehow doing the world a disservice by not knowing it. But you don't have to feel guilty for how you were brought up and what you learned along the way because that is merely the background to who you are.

 

School is not the end to education, merely preparation for a lifetime of it.

[MoogleViper]

Ok on this topic I agree pretty much with what Aimless said.

 

But on the topic of school history I think it's pretty crap. I'm really interested in history but the majority of history taught in school's is WWII. At least 50% of time is spent doing that. I'd much rather learn about ancient civilisations such as the Egyptians, Incas, Aztecs, Babylonians etc. We do learn a tiny bit about Egyptians in primary school but not much. We learn about the Romans and a tiny bit about the Greeks. But we spend far too much time on the world wars in my opinion.

[Noodleman]

I must have been lucky then because I did loads of different periods of history at secondary school and didn't really focus on the World Wars until A-level. Off the top of my head I can remember doing at secondary school:

 

Romans, Greeks, Egyptians, The Wild West, Ancient Britain, Medieval History (Charlemagne and co), Medicine through the ages or something like that, Vikings, Anglo Saxons, the Norman conquest and Vietnam.

 

Sure there where some others as well. History though :awesome:

[MoogleViper]

Well we touched upon Romans, Egyptians, Vikings, Saxons and Tudors in primary school. Also did some WWII. Then when we got to year seven it was mainly WWII with a bit of WWI and some English revolution.

[Raining_again]

Funny you posted this thread on the 12th July, our "historic day".

 

I'm not all that interested in history - probably because ours is so tainted and blood stained.

[Ganepark32]

I agree that history taught in British schools seems to focus solely on our own history and then the World Wars. Yes, these are integral moments and parts of our history but isn't the subject about more than reinforcing our own past. We shouldn't forget that which has preceded us but surely we should have been taught a more varied experience looking at other cultures and their histories. I understand that geography is probably more of a study of other people and their history/culture but the subject of History falls into this category.

 

You know, not everyone finds the British history interesting. It was because this is all that is taught that I gave up on history after 2nd year at high school. I would loved to have learned more about the ancient civilisations beyond the noncalant teachings of primary school and yeah, I could look it up myself but in terms of a schooling environment, a wider variety of history leads to a much better understanding of the world instead of a narrowing by only knowing our own history.

 

Britain certainly does have a 'superiority complex' in regards to how it views itself. We're not the worst for it as there are countries that think higher of themselves but the politicians who run the country really think of themselves as god's gift to the world and really do give Britain a bad name. I don't know why they have this complex but in reality, we are no different from any other collection of countries.

[weeyellowbloke]

I don't know. I think I got a pretty good variety of topics in history at school. Definately better than say 50 years ago when a lessons would have consisted of learning all the monarchs in order by heart. I remember covering Ancient Egypt, the history of medicine which went all the way from ancient Greece to the present day, the history of Ireland, First and Second World Wars, the Industrial Revolution and European colonialism and the rise of the Mongol Empire (although this was my independent A-level study).

 

As for the superiority complex of Britain, I frankly blame the massive readership of tabloid shite. It seems to have lead to a generation of British people who seems to feel that Britain is the pinnacle of human society and has the same level of influence as during our empire days. Look in any red top "news"paper and you'll be lucky to find two pages of world news among all the "Taxes cause cancer" and "Gordon Brown is an arse" headlines.

[Eenuh]

I just remember finding it really weird that you get so little history there (at least from what Flinky told me). I find history to be a very important part in people's life, as you need to know what has happened in the past, how that has affected the present you're living in now. How can you get better as a person and a nation if you can't learn from the past?

 

Over here, history is a compulsory subject (unless things have changed, which I doubt). I had history in primary school and we saw everything from prehistoric ages up to present day, but of course in very broad terms.

Then in secondary school we had it for 6 years, again going over prehistoric ages, Egyptian, Greek and Roman culture, Celts and Vikings, Middle Ages, all the important wars that went on around the world, the revolutions, the World Wars, Cold War and Vietnam, conflicts in the Middle-East etc.

 

We saw so much, and I think it really helps to give you a better view on the world, the political history in different parts of the world and how that has lead to current affairs. Of course it is important to learn about the history of your country as well, since that is where you're living (and in most cases where you will spend the rest of your life), but in my opinion it's just as important to learn about the world around you.

[dwarf]

Ok on this topic I agree pretty much with what Aimless said.

 

But on the topic of school history I think it's pretty crap. I'm really interested in history but the majority of history taught in school's is WWII. At least 50% of time is spent doing that. I'd much rather learn about ancient civilisations such as the Egyptians, Incas, Aztecs, Babylonians etc. We do learn a tiny bit about Egyptians in primary school but not much. We learn about the Romans and a tiny bit about the Greeks. But we spend far too much time on the world wars in my opinion.

 

I share this, we need to know about the wars but ancient history surpasses modern history in terms of interest.

[Konfucius]

In primary school we got taught about the history of our region and also touched on the history of Austria a bit. In secondary school we heard everything that also was in Mel Brook's History of the World. I mean we really started history in the stone age, going through all the different ages to Sumerian, Egyptian and Greek culture - especially looking at how these cultures were organised, briefly touching on trading relations, voting and we also had to learn when a certain battles happened, which still puzzles me as to why that is important. Next stop was the Roman Empire which consisted mainly of learning dates of battles and who killed whom when exactly. We fast forwarded through the dark ages to the time when Austria had it's biggest size and then spent a lot of time examining what circumstances led to the french revolution. Then taking a good look at the french revolution itself and what Napoleon was doing. We also rushed through the next centuries slowly concentrating more on Austrian history and learning a lot about what led to World War 1, then looking at the time between WW1 and WW2 also from an Austrian point of view but touching briefly on fascism and Mussolini. After that we got half-heartedly taught about WW2, and by that I mean that the schoolbook and more or less every form of media pretends that Austria was a victim of Hitler's insanity.

 

Edit: I forgot I also learned about colonisation of "the new world" and the whole slave trading thingy.

Edit2: And industrial revolution.

Edited July 12, 2009 by Konfucius

[Jonnas]

Let's see... I was never a big fan of history during school, but I recall spending the first 4 years slightly touching on some key aspects of Portuguese History/Culture, years 5-6 were spent quickly covering Portuguese history (with some hints of international history, namely the American, French and industrial revolutions, WWII and the Cold War), and years 7-9 was dedicated to world/international history, from ancient civillizations to nowadays (but focusing on Portugal whenever possible).

 

Years 10-12, History wasn't mandatory anymore, but I heard from some friends that they were pretty much reviewing everything, but in more detail.

 

My memory is a bit fuzzy (like I said, I never liked History in school), but I think we spent less time on WWII than we should. Even if it didn't directly affect Portugal, it was pretty important.

I don't remember being taught anything about the Spanish civil war either, and that was a pretty recent thing that happened to our neighbours.

Of course, this may be me forgetting things.

 

As for the British image... I'd say this "superiority complex" is part of the nation's mentality. It's subtly there, I think.

But it's just a stereotype. And better than the national mindset of "we suck" that exists here in Portugal.

Edited July 12, 2009 by Jonnas

[Platty]

Well we touched upon Romans, Egyptians, Vikings, Saxons and Tudors in primary school. Also did some WWII. Then when we got to year seven it was mainly WWII with a bit of WWI and some English revolution.

 

Yeah I remember being taught about similar things.

 

I remember doing a lot of Romans, vikings, saxons etc in primary school along with things like medievil times and what not. Also remember a lot of Henry VIII stuff.

 

In secondary school I remember covering WWI, WWII and the cold war and seem to remember bits and pieces about the american civil war and the Russian revolution and the Tsars and the red army etc.

 

I enjoyed history, got a B in GCSE back in the day

[Pyxis]

British history isn't just British history, our country used to own a huge chunk of the planet and dominated the world's oceans. The US, China (HK), India and etc all used to be British colonies. We also kick started the industrial revolution. I somehow doubt that Belgium has a history that can rival Britain's, unless their people came from another planet.

 

Edited July 12, 2009 by Pyxis

[Jonnas]

BTW Flinky, out of curiosity, what was this "historical-fact-you-didn't-know" that you mentioned in the original post?

[Strider]

I enjoyed history, got a B in GCSE back in the day

 

Snap!

 

Although like the others i would much rather learn about older history. I do remember learning about the native Americans in the years before GCSE and i found that very interesting.

 

GCSE was all about WW1/2, very dull for 2 years but still quite enjoyable. The two coursework essays (which i hated) were about the change in education system in Britain and the American Depression, again not the most worldly wide topics.

[Fierce_LiNk]

BTW Flinky, out of curiosity, what was this "historical-fact-you-didn't-know" that you mentioned in the original post?

 

The fact was about the misconception that the main belief during the middle ages was that the Earth was flat, rather than spherical.

 

Whereas, the idea or notion of the Earth being spherical dated back to the Ancient Greeks, who were the first to speak of this.

 

A lot of confusion seems to date back to the 1800s, where Washington Irving published a book on Christopher Columbus which gave inaccurate information. Columbus didn't set out to determine if the Earth was flat or spherical, but rather the size of the Earth and the location of the East Coast of Asia. He wanted to know this so he could determine an easier trade route for reaching Asia, rather than trekking along through many other countries which would take up time.

 

So, this information is not something that I had previously known. It's not something that I learned in School, because we never did study Ancient Greece, or we never studied other countries outside of our own.

 

Thankfully, between Stephen Fry, Ine, and the internetings, I now know more about this.

 

I will reply to the other posts, too. I thought this would be the easiest to start with as it was the smallest.

 

Those subjects aren't any different from what they teach here, except its about Portugal, although maybe we dig deeper into the international scene around the industrialization. Any previous knowledge we had, for example from Britain, was that there was some Saxons and Celts around there.

 

About the superiority complex of the British, yes there is a bit when comparing to other European countries.

 

Out of curiosity, how do Portugal "see" Britain? I mean, when the subject of Britain ever comes up in conversation, is it in a negative light or positive one?

 

If the British weren't taught British history then no one would be.

 

It isn't so much a superiority complex as a feeling of isolation, I think. Geographically there is a clear separation between the UK and the rest of Europe, and having such fixed borders is a large psychological difference; for comparison Belgium borders on France, The Netherlands, Germany and Luxembourg.

 

I do definitely feel that we are isolated from the rest of Europe. The location of Britain doesn't help, but I personally feel that at times we just prefer to see ourselves as a whole seperate entity. I do think a lot of people outright refuse to catergorise the UK as a part a Europe, but just regard it as something seperate, as if we are in our own continent.

 

On top of that we (mostly) speak English, so in that respect you could say our nearest cultural neighbours are on the other side of the globe. Drawing comparison to Belgium again, that country's population speaks French, Dutch and some German. On a related note a lot of the world's entertainment is put out in English, so outside of school most people aren't that exposed to other languages which exacerbates the divide.

 

I remember I had this conversation with another person, who said that a lot of entertainment, business, news and other such things were primarily in English, so there was no emphasis on us to learn other languages. For the most part, I do think she has a point. One problem I do have is that in school, we are taught "tourist" French or Spanish. So, we're not being equipped with good skills if we ever really needed to use these languages in a context other than visiting the country for a week and returning. Maybe that is why a big proportion of this country will always live within this country, because the language in other countries is a big barrier.

 

I'm sure there are many citizens who think the UK is the last bastion of civilisation, but the same can be said for subsets of every other country. That's just people. Let's not pretend everyone in mainland Europe is an open-minded individual that's well versed in world history; that's as lazy and inaccurate as rolling out "Americans are stupid".

 

I do agree with this, and I guess every country has its fair share of people who are open-minded, or patriotic, or something or other. So, well said.

 

I've never been to Newport, but I'd hazard a guess that there's a huge difference between it and, say, London. The latter's something of a cultural melting pot whereas I can tell you that the population of Devon is orders of magnitude less diverse in terms of ethnicity. So you see even micro level geography can shape your outlook on the world as it affects what you're exposed to.

 

I checked the Newport website, and it says that it's currently around 71% Christian-based, with around 11% choosing not to disclose their religion. Muslims make up 2.8% of the total, but I think this must be an inaccurate value. It seems pretty diverse, but then I think Brighton was also very diverse, but in a lot of different ways. In Brighton, for example in my halls of Residence, I lived with 2 French Girls, A German Girl, 2 other Welsh people and one English boy. There were also a lot of people who came over from Spain or Germany to study, so it was mixed in a different way to that of Newport.

 

And it's exposure that makes the internet so great! Above me we have someone from Portugal responding to your question, and earlier you were talking to your Belgian girlfriend via this elaborate series of tubes. Geography holds no sway here, Flink, and as an adult you're free to go ahead a learn about whatever you like: rather than asking yourself why you didn't know that piece of history from QI, why not spend the time reading up on it instead? In truth you probably didn't really care about the information itself, more the idea that you were somehow doing the world a disservice by not knowing it. But you don't have to feel guilty for how you were brought up and what you learned along the way because that is merely the background to who you are.

 

School is not the end to education, merely preparation for a lifetime of it.

 

I do agree with the last sentence, in that it does prepare you. But, I feel that more should be done to encourage others to be curious about the world as a whole, and not just curious about our own country and heritage. Yeah, we're citizens of Britain, but we're also World Citizens, which is an idea that I just don't think was encouraged enough in school. Yeah, after you leave school, you can do what you like in terms of learning about well..anything. But, school should be more of a starting point than I think it is.

 

Sorry, I think I botched up what I was trying to say in that last paragraph. My eyes hurt, but that was a good post, Aimless, haha.

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

History truly is important, though I think it can be difficult for teachers to get through all the necessary topics. It's a very broad subject.

[Fierce_LiNk]

History truly is important, though I think it can be difficult for teachers to get through all the necessary topics. It's a very broad subject.

 

Definitely, it is a very broad subject. But, at the moment, I feel sometimes that maybe it is being taught in a very narrow way, just focusing on British History.

 

I mean, look at what Noodleman studied:

 

"Romans, Greeks, Egyptians, The Wild West, Ancient Britain, Medieval History (Charlemagne and co), Medicine through the ages or something like that, Vikings, Anglo Saxons, the Norman conquest and Vietnam."

 

All at Secondary School. See, that's what I'm talking about! You're covering a lot more of the world that way. I always had a fascination with Egypt as a kid, and in Secondary School we didn't touch on this in the slightest. Big disappointment.

[navarre]

It's the same anywhere else in the world (hell, in the US, it's even called 'US History'). I think the general consensus is that British history is almost certainly the most important type of history to know about, what, with us living in Britain and stuff, and international historical research can be achieved by studying at university, or even by home study. the resources for home study , such as the internet, are almost certainly there.

 

My history GCSE course had half British history (WW1, WW2, etc) and half international history (Bolsheviks, great depression, Vietnam, Cold War..)

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

Your own country's history is definitely important, but your country's history is part of the world's history, so you should definitely know about that, too. At the moment a war is being waged in Denmark about whether the Ancient Studies subject about Classical Rome and Greece should be merged with the regular History subject. Needless to say, we Classics very much oppose it. As if the History subject hasn't got enough to cover already.

[Jonnas]

The fact was about the misconception that the main belief during the middle ages was that the Earth was flat, rather than spherical.

 

Whereas, the idea or notion of the Earth being spherical dated back to the Ancient Greeks, who were the first to speak of this.

 

A lot of confusion seems to date back to the 1800s, where Washington Irving published a book on Christopher Columbus which gave inaccurate information. Columbus didn't set out to determine if the Earth was flat or spherical, but rather the size of the Earth and the location of the East Coast of Asia. He wanted to know this so he could determine an easier trade route for reaching Asia, rather than trekking along through many other countries which would take up time.

 

So, this information is not something that I had previously known. It's not something that I learned in School, because we never did study Ancient Greece, or we never studied other countries outside of our own.

 

Thankfully, between Stephen Fry, Ine, and the internetings, I now know more about this.

 

Curious... I remember being taught that the Greeks did come up with that concept, but we never mentioned it again, I think.

 

Of course, that Colombus wanted to establish a faster trading route with Asia is obvious, but I don't quite remember exactly why the Portuguese refused his idea.

But considering the nautical advances of the time, I suppose the most experienced navigators would've noticed the Earth wasn't flat.

The Portuguese probably didn't think that financing a trip around the globe was a profittable move.

 

Out of curiosity, how do Portugal "see" Britain? I mean, when the subject of Britain ever comes up in conversation, is it in a negative light or positive one?

 

You're all blonde, pale and love to spend your summers in Algarve

 

Historically, there's not much to say, considering we never went to war (Portugal and England share the world's oldest alliance, if I'm not mistaken). In our history, the only noteworthy conflict we had was that Pink Map fiasco.

 

Of course, we referenced the Brittish empire once in a while. It would be silly not to.

Also, English is mandatory for at least 5 years (in my school, they tried for a few more years for my class, but I don't think it stuck), but we spent some time learning about a few things about current UK/US, so we spend some extra time on those countries' culture as part of language formation.

 

I do definitely feel that we are isolated from the rest of Europe. The location of Britain doesn't help, but I personally feel that at times we just prefer to see ourselves as a whole seperate entity. I do think a lot of people outright refuse to catergorise the UK as a part a Europe, but just regard it as something seperate, as if we are in our own continent.

 

I remember I had this conversation with another person, who said that a lot of entertainment, business, news and other such things were primarily in English, so there was no emphasis on us to learn other languages. For the most part, I do think she has a point. One problem I do have is that in school, we are taught "tourist" French or Spanish. So, we're not being equipped with good skills if we ever really needed to use these languages in a context other than visiting the country for a week and returning. Maybe that is why a big proportion of this country will always live within this country, because the language in other countries is a big barrier.

 

The english language runs the entertainment media. I'd say you're right, the Anglophones are slightly snobbier than others because they don't think other languages are worth learning.

The language is the first step into learning things about other countries, and without that first step...

[Emasher]

I had a great teacher the year we did European history (Greece, Rome, The Middle Ages, and The Renaissance), We spent a few months on Rome, and IMO its one of the most interesting points in history.

[Shino]

You're all blonde, pale and love to spend your summers in Algarve

Historically, there's not much to say, considering we never went to war (Portugal and England share the world's oldest alliance, if I'm not mistaken). In our history, the only noteworthy conflict we had was that Pink Map fiasco.

 

I was trying to not go there but its undeniable. Although the stereotype doesn't carry any negativity.Also, Britain is considered very developed and London is a chic place to live in.

 

Tbh I think its overall pretty neutral with a bit for the positive.