It’s profound to me that, despite many British institutions actively possessing and publishing this history – many in the UK are entirely unaware and actively misled with regard to just how long different British demographics and their communities have been present in the country.
I think this is among the most grave issues with state education in creating long held misunderstandings and tensions that mean the country is repeatedly blighted by cycles of political unrest and tensions that undo sometimes DECADES of industrial, economical and human rights advances in one fell swoop.
As long as much of the state educated population continues to have an intensely warped view of race, mixed communities and immigration in the UK (in major cities and rural areas beyond), believing that prior to as recent as WWII these were non existent or poorly established – these fallouts will continue and be a most easy and impactful way of distracting us all politically time and time again.
Few in the UK know basic and widely accessible facts including Liverpool being home to one of Europe’s oldest and most consistently Mixed-Race communities for centuries. Queen Victoria having a Black Goddaughter – Sara Forbes Bonetta – who the former arranged in marriage to a Black industrialist tycoon, Captain James Pinson Labulo Davies. The first Black Mayor in London, John Archer, taking his post in the year 1913. The UK’s first Mixed political group forming in the late 1700s.
Here are links and footage to all I reference and more:
●https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/being-black-britains-oldest-black-21066287.amp
●https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.standard.co.uk/culture/exhibitions/photographs-of-black-britons-in-1800s-unearthed-after-125-years-reveal-rich-and-diverse-black-presence-a3251531.html
●https://mobile.twitter.com/bbctwo/status/796464416321585156?lang=en
●https://exhibition.mixedmuseum.org.uk/museum/timeline/founding-of-the-coloured-mens-institute-in-east-london
●https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Committee_for_the_Relief_of_the_Black_Poor
●https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sons_of_Africa
●https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiger_Bay
●https://poplarlondon.co.uk/limehouse-chinatown-history/
●https://www.bristolmuseums.org.uk/stories/early-black-presence-in-bristol/
●https://historicengland.org.uk/research/inclusive-heritage/the-slave-trade-and-abolition/sites-of-memory/black-lives-in-england/
●https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Archer_(British_politician)
●https://www.discoveringbristol.org.uk/slavery/after-slavery/bristol-in-black-and-white/african-caribbean-bristol/18th-century-other-records/
●https://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/stories/1919-race-riots-centenary-looking-back-untold-stories
●https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/resources/1919-race-riots/
●https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1919_South_Wales_race_riots
●https://www.bbc.co.uk/tyne/roots/2003/10/arabontyne.shtml
7 comments
There have always been some black people in Britain therefore not wanting to let in unlimited foreigners is unreasonable and evil and racist, I know how this one goes
Things are fortunately changing all the time though. Schools now have black history months and learn more about key individuals. Even in our primary, children learn about the triangular trade and about specific individuals like Ignatius Sancho, Queen Victoria’s goddaughter and Mary Secole while older children wrote biographies of significant black inventors and scientists. Strangely there is still very little about asian communities or other ethnic groups though (at least in schools where I have worked) Hopefully that will also shift as time goes on.
>let me tell you are story, a story of William Adams.
>
>..I am a Kentish-man, borne in a Towne called Gillingham, two English miles from Rochester, one mile from Chattam, where the Kings ships lye : and that from the age of twelve yeares, I was brought up in Lime-house neere London, being Prentise twelve yeares to one Master Nicholas Diggines, and have served in the place of Master and Pilot in her Majesties ships, and about eleven or twelve yeares served the Worshipfull Company of the Barbarie Marchants, untill the Indian Trafficke from Holland began, in which Indian Trafficke I was desirous to make a little experience of the small knowledge which God had given me. So, in the yeare of our Lord God, 1598. I was hired for chiefe Pilot of a Fleete of five sayle, which was made readie by the chiefe of the Indian Company Peter Vanderhag, and Hance Vanderueke
>
>…
>
>Coming before the king, he viewed me well, and seemed to be wonderfully favourable. He made many signs unto me, some of which I understood, and some I did not. In the end, there came one that could speak Portuguese. By him, the king demanded of me of what land I was, and what moved us to come to his land, being so far off. I showed unto him the name of our country, and that our land had long sought out the East Indies, and desired friendship with all kings and potentates in way of merchandise, having in our land diverse commodities, which these lands had not… Then he asked whether our country had wars? I answered him yea, with the Spaniards and Portugals, being in peace with all other nations. Further, he asked me, in what I did believe? I said, in God, that made heaven and earth. He asked me diverse other questions of things of religions, and many other things: As what way we came to the country. Having a chart of the whole world, I showed him, through the Strait of Magellan. At which he wondered, and thought me to lie. Thus, from one thing to another, I abode with him till mid-night.
what was the point of this story? well a English man had a political position in japan therefore it is a multicultural and mix-race nation because this English guy lived there.
other points the Dutch ran the trade island of Dejima, the portuguese got up to a lot in the name of Christ. the Spanish had some trade routes and got into a famous fight with the wokou
​
>They eat with their fingers instead of with chopsticks such as we use. They show their feelings without any self-control. They cannot understand the meaning of written characters
oh how things never change
Cool
What about the poor white boys who have always been failed by the education system
Do you care about them or do you want even more money to be spent help non white children and white girls who do much better in school now
If only the authorities cared about teaching children to read, write, add up and just be productive and responsible members of society as much as they care about pushing divisive social issues like this.
If some people want to be recognised as the descendants of victims, that’s fine, but it shouldn’t influence educational policy.
Would have been easier to post the official census results, but that wouldnt suit the op’s narrative…
Census data indicates that in 1951 99.9% of the population were [identified as White British](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demography_of_the_United_Kingdom), whereas by 2021 this [figure stood at 74.4%](https://www.ethnicity-facts-figures.service.gov.uk/uk-population-by-ethnicity/national-and-regional-populations/population-of-england-and-wales/latest#by-ethnicity-over-time).
There have certainly been people of different ethnicities on these islands for many years, but the changes in demographics since the Second World War are certainly significant. I’m not sure it benefits anyone perpetuating a narrative that this isn’t the case.
With respect to education, we have thousands of years of history to cover so inevitably schools are going to focus on the big historical events which have shaped society and the constitution. I don’t think it’s doing pupils a disservice to have this approach.