History in school focuses on European history, which doesn’t really have much racism in it (it has other not-fun stuff). And until fairly recently, especially for eastern Europe, there weren’t that many people of color, so you wouldn’t really encounter racism as an issue. I mean, your parents would say some wild stereotype about black people, but no one would bat an eye, so you wouldn’t know that it’s bad. With internet and general globalization it’s changing now, but there’s still a long way to go
European history “doesn’t really have much racism in it”? Huh? You sure we’re talking about the same european history here? Maybe in some parts of Europe this isn’t taught, but I definitely learned in school about colonialism, the transatlantic slave trade, the Nazi’s racism against Slavs and Romas etc…
I’ll start by saying that I didn’t pay too much attention during history classes, but it probably just puts me closer to the average person on that topic.
The way I remember history classes (I’m from Poland), is that they were heavily focused on our country (excluding sections where we talked about ancient history, obviously) and on how our country fought to keep existing. The wars it had with its neighbors, the fights over land, etc. And Poland didn’t really participate in colonialism, so it was just mentioned that other countries went to Africa and got slaves, but that’s mostly it. And we knew that slavery is bad. But there wasn’t too much effort on elaborating on this topic. Partially because that realization is still trickling in.
I’m simplifying a lot, but I think that’s mostly what you’d carry out of those lessons. Maybe there was a week where we talked about the civil war in America, but that’s very little compared to the rest of the topics, so it doesn’t stay with you.
If you consider the history of Poland, it kind of makes sense. There was a lot of struggle to not be eradicated, to preserve our culture, etc. And that’s reflected in what we learn in school.
And I’m not defending the way it is now. I personally don’t like how “selfish” the point of view in those classes is. But I am sharing my experiences and thoughts, to add some context.
European history is basically “and these people there killed each other because they didn’t like the pope” so it’s not exactly a surprise we are less sensitive to “this is racist” rhetoric, when every single possible reason has been used to justify slaughtering each other. If St. Barthelemy was not racist, why should the crusades be?
American history is pretty much always them murdering non-whites, in comparison
Note that I’m not defending the reasoning, or the problems it creates today, but I see way too many people online acting like Europeans were all BFFs before the empires came up
Do Europeans just not learn about the scramble for Africa and the Berlin Conference of 1885 or something? How do you have so many colonial powers and none of your history classes touch on the murdering of non-whites? This feels like some truly insane educational blinders
Yes it did touch the scramble for Africa and Germany’s colonies. But colonialism is a comparitively minor part of that period (1890 - 1920) for Germany so it was the focus for a couple of lessons only. The genocide was covered - but again, only for like a single lesson or two.
There’s just a bit too much history to cramp it down into 90 minutes per week and go over in detail, especially since teaching about the world wars is a priority.
I mean, we literally crammed the period 1970ish to reunification within a single lesson at the very end of 12th grade because we ran out of time.
That’s a fair point. I don’t know that I would say colonialism was minor for Germany, but I suppose the advantage of American education is you have a lot fewer years of crimes against humanity to cover since its a younger country.
I meant more like in the sense of not exceeding a single chapter in a history book. It did happen and was significant – but overshadowed by WW1 happening shortly thereafter and ending German colonization right then and there (except for WW2 but that’s another topic).
A significant part of Europe did not participate in the scramble for Africa, which can in part explain OP pic - the guy is from Poland.
There was no Berlin conference in 1845.
Anyway, each country has its own educational system, with different scope and methods of teaching history (unavoidably wildly different due to different national histories), so making any blanket statement on what is taught in Europe is a minefield. Now, I’m pretty sure most kids in Europe are taught about the colonisation of Africa, but how exactly it is presented, how much weight is given to it, how it is integrated into broader cultural discourse (including e.g. does anyone even talk or care about it outside school history lessons) can vary wildly.
Practically speaking, why would Poles have to care e.g. about English colonisation of India a whole lot? Do you really think such stuff can be relevant enough to strongly shape people’s worldview?
1885 is way too recent. Anything past 1800 is Napoleon taking Europe, everyone’s local consequences, and then WW1. There’s a thousand and a half years of material to discuss before that even after Greece and Rome, this is only the very end and if you’re paying attention.
Yeah, even in the US (who Europe makes fun of for not knowing history) we spent a ton of time on the triangle trade with Africa (which Europe was very much the creator of and active participant in).
Like the “we didn’t have a lot of racism here” when they were the powers enslaving the native populations to sell to their other colonies…is an insane thing to say.
History in school focuses on European history, which doesn’t really have much racism in it (it has other not-fun stuff). And until fairly recently, especially for eastern Europe, there weren’t that many people of color, so you wouldn’t really encounter racism as an issue. I mean, your parents would say some wild stereotype about black people, but no one would bat an eye, so you wouldn’t know that it’s bad. With internet and general globalization it’s changing now, but there’s still a long way to go
European history “doesn’t really have much racism in it”? Huh? You sure we’re talking about the same european history here? Maybe in some parts of Europe this isn’t taught, but I definitely learned in school about colonialism, the transatlantic slave trade, the Nazi’s racism against Slavs and Romas etc…
Are slavs a race?
yes?
As a slav myself, TIL.
yeah, also in nazi terms, we are not white
We are not Aryan, probably. White is the other nazis ’ vocabulary.
… So those lessons on the many centuries of European colonization** included zero self reflection on the racism involved?
I’ll start by saying that I didn’t pay too much attention during history classes, but it probably just puts me closer to the average person on that topic.
The way I remember history classes (I’m from Poland), is that they were heavily focused on our country (excluding sections where we talked about ancient history, obviously) and on how our country fought to keep existing. The wars it had with its neighbors, the fights over land, etc. And Poland didn’t really participate in colonialism, so it was just mentioned that other countries went to Africa and got slaves, but that’s mostly it. And we knew that slavery is bad. But there wasn’t too much effort on elaborating on this topic. Partially because that realization is still trickling in.
I’m simplifying a lot, but I think that’s mostly what you’d carry out of those lessons. Maybe there was a week where we talked about the civil war in America, but that’s very little compared to the rest of the topics, so it doesn’t stay with you.
If you consider the history of Poland, it kind of makes sense. There was a lot of struggle to not be eradicated, to preserve our culture, etc. And that’s reflected in what we learn in school.
And I’m not defending the way it is now. I personally don’t like how “selfish” the point of view in those classes is. But I am sharing my experiences and thoughts, to add some context.
Poland was too busy being enslaved by ottomans, tatars and russians to care about racism.
ottomans and tatars?
For many centuries. Google “jasyr”.
European history is basically “and these people there killed each other because they didn’t like the pope” so it’s not exactly a surprise we are less sensitive to “this is racist” rhetoric, when every single possible reason has been used to justify slaughtering each other. If St. Barthelemy was not racist, why should the crusades be?
American history is pretty much always them murdering non-whites, in comparison
Note that I’m not defending the reasoning, or the problems it creates today, but I see way too many people online acting like Europeans were all BFFs before the empires came up
Do Europeans just not learn about the scramble for Africa and the Berlin Conference of 1885 or something? How do you have so many colonial powers and none of your history classes touch on the murdering of non-whites? This feels like some truly insane educational blinders
EDIT: Corrected conference date
I can only speak for Germany’s history education.
Yes it did touch the scramble for Africa and Germany’s colonies. But colonialism is a comparitively minor part of that period (1890 - 1920) for Germany so it was the focus for a couple of lessons only. The genocide was covered - but again, only for like a single lesson or two.
There’s just a bit too much history to cramp it down into 90 minutes per week and go over in detail, especially since teaching about the world wars is a priority.
I mean, we literally crammed the period 1970ish to reunification within a single lesson at the very end of 12th grade because we ran out of time.
That’s a fair point. I don’t know that I would say colonialism was minor for Germany, but I suppose the advantage of American education is you have a lot fewer years of crimes against humanity to cover since its a younger country.
Sorry, I didn’t mean minor in that sense.
I meant more like in the sense of not exceeding a single chapter in a history book. It did happen and was significant – but overshadowed by WW1 happening shortly thereafter and ending German colonization right then and there (except for WW2 but that’s another topic).
A significant part of Europe did not participate in the scramble for Africa, which can in part explain OP pic - the guy is from Poland.
There was no Berlin conference in 1845.
Anyway, each country has its own educational system, with different scope and methods of teaching history (unavoidably wildly different due to different national histories), so making any blanket statement on what is taught in Europe is a minefield. Now, I’m pretty sure most kids in Europe are taught about the colonisation of Africa, but how exactly it is presented, how much weight is given to it, how it is integrated into broader cultural discourse (including e.g. does anyone even talk or care about it outside school history lessons) can vary wildly.
Practically speaking, why would Poles have to care e.g. about English colonisation of India a whole lot? Do you really think such stuff can be relevant enough to strongly shape people’s worldview?
1885 is way too recent. Anything past 1800 is Napoleon taking Europe, everyone’s local consequences, and then WW1. There’s a thousand and a half years of material to discuss before that even after Greece and Rome, this is only the very end and if you’re paying attention.
Yeah, even in the US (who Europe makes fun of for not knowing history) we spent a ton of time on the triangle trade with Africa (which Europe was very much the creator of and active participant in).
Like the “we didn’t have a lot of racism here” when they were the powers enslaving the native populations to sell to their other colonies…is an insane thing to say.