Slavery and Colonialism Are Everyone’s History

[GodessOfThunder]

I was on a thread recently where posters were complaining of slavery and colonialism being “shoehorned” into exhibitions, and were strongly “pushing back” against it being given prominence as a topic in museums and at historic sites. Indeed, transatlantic slavery and colonialism often seem to be regarded as niche historical subjects of interest more to people of colour, and involving only a small number of rich white slave owners and colonial officials.

This perception however, does not reflect reality. Transatlantic slavery effected not only millions of Africans, but pretty much everyone in Britain too. Similarly, colonialism effected not only millions of subjects in the British Empire, but everyone “at home” also. The economy these projects fuelled changed what ordinary people ate and drank and what they wore. They changed how British people thought about non-European people in ways that continue to shape their mindset and create injustice today. Slavery and colonialism helped fund the Industrial Revolution and the jobs people in Britain performed, and much more too.

I’m not suggesting anyone today should feel guilty for these activities. But, these subjects are still all too often not regarded as part of all of our histories. This means attempts to give them proper prominence are met with resistance. If we are to understand British history at a public level properly there is still a great deal of work to do.

@Newusername1273

And this is where the nuance comes in... not every bit of colonisation was done without the consent of the people/governments. A significant number were happy to cooperate with the British.

I'd be interested to know what - if anything - is on the curriculum regarding British colonialism in Australia. That was essentially genocide for the indigenous peoples, and slavery. I live on a documented colonial massacre site. Those killed, including women and children, were hunted down as it was thought they has stolen food from a landowner. After the event, it turned out they hadn't. These sorts of events were not isolated.

c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/colonialmassacres/map.php

These people had no opportunity to consent.

I agree, but just to clarify I don’t mean “everyone” in strictly a genealogical sense. Anyone living in Britain becomes part of British society, and slavery and colonialism are important aspects of that society’s history.

Sharing the same reply as I gave to another commenter making a similar point:

Just to clarify, I don’t mean “everyone” in a strictly genealogical sense. Anyone living in Britain becomes part of British society. Slavery and colonialism are important aspects of that society’s history.

Great thread OP. Unfortunately, I'm too scared to read the comments.

iirc we were taught about Australia in the context of penal colonies, forced emigration of DCs from minority and vulnerable British communities, and on the impact on indigenous peoples in Australia. We were also taught about the legacy of ongoing discrimination and land grabs.
What does the Australian curriculum teach about the genocide, displacement and continued discrimination against indigenous peoples? Does it teach it at primary and high school level? In politics or history?
Does Australia teach about the sentencing and crimes that could lead to being exiled? And the ongoing search by families from impoverished, vulnerable and minority groups in Britain whose DCs were sent to Australia without their consent? If those issues are widely known it should help the families here who are still campaigning around those issues and still trying to trace family DCs who were taken.

Slavery is at its height today. There are more slaves today than there have ever been. Sometimes we talk about the past too much and not about today.

Whats the point talking about slavery if we aren't doing anything about modern slavery?

Chickeev in Ireland these things are relevant as they entirely changed the country as it is today.

It's important to talk about the past to learn from it. Modern slavery and human trafficking needs to be addressed too. It shouldn't be an 'either/or'.
There is a throughline but modern slavery and human trafficking are incredibly complex. It's more akin to organised crime and perpetuated by criminal networks than governments. Although imo all governments tacitly condone it by not closing down known companies that benefit eg Pornhub.
Most victims of trafficking (over 60%) are women and DCs. Most perpetrators (over 60%) are men. No-one ever cares as much about stopping an issue when it mainly affects women and DCs. There is always a lack of political will to police crimes against women and VAWG.

@AlexandriasWindmill

iirc we were taught about Australia in the context of penal colonies, forced emigration of DCs from minority and vulnerable British communities, and on the impact on indigenous peoples in Australia. We were also taught about the legacy of ongoing discrimination and land grabs.
What does the Australian curriculum teach about the genocide, displacement and continued discrimination against indigenous peoples? Does it teach it at primary and high school level? In politics or history?

Does Australia teach about the sentencing and crimes that could lead to being exiled? And the ongoing search by families from impoverished, vulnerable and minority groups in Britain whose DCs were sent to Australia without their consent? If those issues are widely known it should help the families here who are still campaigning around those issues and still trying to trace family DCs who were taken.

The curriculum here has changed greatly over time. I wasn't taught a great deal of any of these things as a child of the 70s and 80s. Now, kids have much First Nations history embedded in their curriculums from very early on. I wouldn't suggest they learn much about British children sent to Australia without consent - they learn much more about Australia's indigenous Stolen Generation, where children of indigenous families were forcibly removed by the Government and sent to Children's Homes (where many were abused) or the homes of white people. I only learned about this at university, so I'm pleased things are changing there.

They do learn, in passing I suppose, about the types of crimes that sent people here.

The genocide and ongoing discrimination and racism of First Nations people is taught more at high school level, but not deeply enough, IMO.

WWII was part of German's history but no I don't think the German people of today have to take the blame, same as anyone from where Genghis Kahn roamed, what about the Romans?

and what do you want people to do about it?

That’s the equivalent of saying “there’s war in Ukraine, so let’s stop studying World War 2”. I’ll assume you don’t agree with that statement, so why make a similar one about past slavery?

Ask yourself what are your motivations for wanting to silence this aspect of the past? It must make you feel threatened in some way.

Is it? Think my ancestors were too busy trying to eke a living to feed their families.

Wilberforce and abolition is traditionally one of the few aspects of slavery many British people have already heard of. It suited elites to propagate this narrative.

I disagree with this, most people not just here but globally have no clue this is what happened and its hardly ever mentioned when this topic comes up on social media etc. I don't agree people aren't aware of our involvement in slavery overall though, I've never met anyone ignorant to it and I grew up on a sink estate and don't hang around solely with enlightened historians or whatever.

That's not to say people could know more but that's the same for any topic surely?

So you don't want speaking of slavery today, you want to pick and choose which bits of history of focus on why? does speaking of modern slavery make you feel threatened?

Well, it would seem a little odd for current events to be taught in a history class, wouldn't it?

What is fascinating is that often certain groups try to weaponise discussions about slavery and colonialism to pit discriminated groups against each other. Reading this thread you can see the groups that consistently suffer - minorities, women, the poor. Those groups 'fighting' amongst themselves only benefits the wealthy and influential. It's standard 'divide and conquer'. We should all be working together to raise each other's voices and histories.

The absences in history education are where countries/governments feel vulnerable and are still reliant on those groups' exploitation. In the UK that isn't slavery or penal colonies. It's Ireland. It's religious discrimination. It's Gypsy, Roma and Travellers (GRT). It's also women. It's why the current MRA pushback against women's rights is combined with a push to 're-educate'. The battles women thought they had won are being lost at speed - the aggressors need a curriculum that pushes their new agenda and pushes out the history of suffragettes, women's liberation, etc.

For me it is not just the wealth disparity , there are so many instances you as a POC are viewed as inferior and discriminated against.
This is because of colonialism and the mentality of one race being superior to other. I completely understand that we have come a long way but it is still not good enough from my point of view.

India was one of the richest country when British empire came to India and they were the poorest when they left. Economic growth of Britain was phenomenal during this time.

Colonialism and its effect - good and bad needs to be taught in schools and it doesn't even get mentioned!

“It's boring and people can't relate to the people, places and actions of past generations”

That is no doubt true of some people. But the readers of the huge number of history books published each year, viewers of innumerable documentaries and period dramas, and the growing number of visitors to Britains many museums may not agree.

Why? there is modern history but there is also discussions in history about comparing life now and in the past? it is not all teachers sitting in the front of the classroom droning on about back in the day

I don't know what is taught about Australia in schools. As with Ireland my learning on this subject came much later.

It's mostly about talking about "back in the day" - that's the very definition of the subject: "the study of past events". At most it'd get a passing mention, because it's not history.

Not at all. To understand why we are where we are you need to dig into history. Many issues - especially sensitive political ones - are discussed in history classes.

I always saw England as the first English colony.

Most of the land is still owned by the descendants of people who arrived and took the land by force a thousand years ago.

History, politics and modern studies cross over. As my DC said to me 'what you learnt in modern studies will be in my history classes'. So yy it is important to look at what people learn about 'current/modern' situations too. They're establishing the narrative for future history lessons.