London Socialist Historians
12th June
Contact Dr Keith Flett 07803 167266
Historians challenge Boris Johnson on ‘editing the past’. Call for black history to be taught in schools
The London Socialist Historians Group, which organises the socialist history seminar at the Institute of Historical Research, has challenged Boris Johnson to ‘put his money where his mouth is’ when it comes to history teaching in schools.
Commenting on the Black Lives Matter movement and the debate around statues of historical figures the Prime Minister tweeted on 12th June.
“We cannot now try to edit or censor our past,” he said. “We cannot pretend to have a different history. The statues in our cities and towns were put up by previous generations. They had different perspectives, different understandings of right and wrong. But those statues teach us about our past, with all its faults. To tear them down would be to lie about our history, and impoverish the education of generations to come.”
The historians say they agree that the past should not be edited or censored, although that does not suggest, for example, that statues have to be displayed in the same spot for ever.
However the reality is that the history of British imperial activities and colonialism remains largely absent from school history teaching, as does the record of black and white people’s opposition to slavery and racism.
LSHG Convenor Dr Keith Flett said, it is more than time that the history of Britain’s imperial past, moved on from being ‘our island story’ to a recognition of the plunder of the wealth of other countries and the racism that it all too often represented. Its time to stop editing and censoring that history and we call on Boris Johnson to recognise that.
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