The General Politics Thread v2.0 (AKA the "Labour are Cunts" thread)

[Vamp]

Maybe it was just my school but we did study Ireland and the troubles. Actually I don't think we ever studied the monarchy. If we did it never left any impression. 

That might have been because my history teacher, also the deputy head, couldn't be arsed with any of that. I remember her having an argument with a parent when she told them their kid couldn't wear facepaint to school on St. George's day and saying "it's a made up story about a dragon." 

Having said that I'm pretty sure all of the first three years were spent learning about both world wars to the point that I can't even watch a war movie without thinking "oh for fuck sake, not again." 

[BomberPat]

there was a bit of Irish History in the GCSE curriculum when I did History, but I don't remember any of it. We might not have even done it, it might have been a choice between that and American history, which really didn't amount to much more than old wild west clichés about how Native Americans "used every bit of the buffalo". If there was any Irish history taught, they managed to do it without any mention of the British, which is kind of like teaching the history of Malaria while leaving out the mosquito.

I don't know what History is like in schools now, but I know what Gove wanted it to be like, and I hate the whole notion of "History" as just being able to rattle off the dates of medieval battles and list all the Kings and Queens in order. That's not History, that's just data and trivia. Knowing specific dates of events doesn't make a good historian, knowing how to contextualise events, how to research, and how to distinguish between credible and unreliable sources is what makes a good historian, and that it's that kind of critical thinking that schools should be teaching. 

[Carbomb]

1 hour ago, BomberPat said:

there was a bit of Irish History in the GCSE curriculum when I did History, but I don't remember any of it. We might not have even done it, it might have been a choice between that and American history, which really didn't amount to much more than old wild west clichés about how Native Americans "used every bit of the buffalo". If there was any Irish history taught, they managed to do it without any mention of the British, which is kind of like teaching the history of Malaria while leaving out the mosquito.

I don't know what History is like in schools now, but I know what Gove wanted it to be like, and I hate the whole notion of "History" as just being able to rattle off the dates of medieval battles and list all the Kings and Queens in order. That's not History, that's just data and trivia. Knowing specific dates of events doesn't make a good historian, knowing how to contextualise events, how to research, and how to distinguish between credible and unreliable sources is what makes a good historian, and that it's that kind of critical thinking that schools should be teaching. 

Thing is, we come back to the issue of content as well. The history teaching I experienced at my school was actually really good for methodology, but the fields that we got to apply them in were limited as hell.

First year: Norman Invasion, Domesday Book, feudalism

Second year: The Tudors, wives of Henry VIII, Mary I, Elizabeth I, Spanish Armada

Third year: Industrial Revolution

Fourth year: SKIP SEVERAL HUNDRED FUCKING YEARS TO WWI

Fifth year: USA from 1918-1945, Prohibition

 

In an odd way, it was very much a history education version/cross-section of that method that Chomsky asserts as being the standard route to preventing change: have very limited parameters outside which is denounced as extreme, then encourage very lively debate between those two narrow parameters.

In this case, limit what students get to learn about, but encourage them to analyse the hell out of what they do get to study. You end up with a whole host of people for whom activity is equated in value to breadth of knowledge, and thus think they've "done the work".

[Tommy!]

1 hour ago, BomberPat said:

it might have been a choice between that and American history, which really didn't amount to much more than old wild west clichés about how Native Americans "used every bit of the buffalo".

Off topic but we didn't get a choice at GCSE and did the American West and history of medicine.

The American West was a lot on "manifest destiny" as a term but not enough on wider American colonization, from Jamestown and mayflower, and expansion west or land deals like the Louisiana purchase, but there was loads on sod buster plows and cowboys actually being sunburnt.

I don't think we even covered some of the first western expansion trails or Lewis and Clark.

I've read more on American history in the last year or two than for that A.

Edited May 26, 2023 by Tommy!

[Keith Houchen]

I detect a thread split on the horizon. Did anyone have local historical stuff that was incorporated into their curriculum? I think anyone who went to school in Cov paid a visit on a school trip to Lunt Roman Fort!

Is there much room for local history on the curriculum? 

[BomberPat]

I was living in Jersey when I did my GCSEs, so there was a lot on the Nazi occupation of the Channel Islands, though whether that was folded into existing curriculum content on WW2 or a whole separate thing, I don't remember.

[Tommy!]

17 minutes ago, Keith Houchen said:

I detect a thread split on the horizon. Did anyone have local historical stuff that was incorporated into their curriculum? I think anyone who went to school in Cov paid a visit on a school trip to Lunt Roman Fort!

Is there much room for local history on the curriculum? 

I'm from just down the road and despite the town having a castle and warrick also being a joyride away we'd go on a trip to Ashby castle and have to write an essay on why it's not actually a castle.

I can only assume it was cheaper.

[King Mal the Glorious]

In primary and junior school we did a few trips to local Roman sites but nothing beyond that. At GCSE level it was all WW1/2 and America post-war. Definitely didn't cover the Troubles or anything else British.

[Jazzy G]

Pretty much all my secondary school history was social and economic history, so lots about feudalism, crop rotation, then a touch of industrial revolution (but mostly Jethro Tull's seed drill. One of their lesser known albums), and onto the founding of the Labour Party. The only time we touched on War was when we had a few spare lessons towards the end of our final term and we watched Blackadder Goes Forth.

[Tommy!]

8 minutes ago, jazzygeofferz said:

crop rotation

in the 14th century was considerably more widespread after 1172.

[Jazzy G]

I would be concerned if the 14th Century was before 1172.

[Keith Houchen]

4 minutes ago, Tommy! said:

in the 14th century was considerably more widespread after 1172.

John?

[SuperBacon]

1 hour ago, Keith Houchen said:

I detect a thread split on the horizon. Did anyone have local historical stuff that was incorporated into their curriculum? I think anyone who went to school in Cov paid a visit on a school trip to Lunt Roman Fort!

Is there much room for local history on the curriculum? 

Twickenham/Richmond is full of Tudors and Stuarts era sites so yeah, and Hampton Court is not too far away.

I've been to Marble Hill House and Ham House more times than I care to remember. Boring as hell. 

[Tim Healys Chutney Spoon]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-65716550

 

Can't see this chap from Labour being much of a cunt here, if anything being the polar opposite.

 

Only one cunt in all this and its Roger Waters

[Merzbow]

Has no cunt seen The Wall or something?