cigars of the beeper:
How do people feel about it now? Most Americans are still proud of it, as you'd expect, but are the British still somewhat embarrased, or angry about it? Is it kind of glossed over in the British schools?
Very good questions cigars. At my school (I went to a comp school in London from the late '70s to the mid '80s) I wasn't taught much at all about American history. I don't know how much they teach about it now at secondary schools, but I suspect it
still is rather 'glossed over' in history lessons (although, it obviously depends on how good the school is).
A few years ago I was complaining to an American friend of mine that Americans were quite ignorant of European history. But when she asked me "and what do you know about American history?" it left me quite stumped! I realized that actually, I was pretty ignorant of American history, particularly the American Revolution. Since then I've tried to make amends and read lots about it. For instance, I didn't know that in the American Revolutionary War (the later stages) France, Holland and Spain had made alliances with the Americans, leaving the British to fight a global war, with no allies.
Even when I was tying to find out about it I couldn't fail to notice the hole in the history books. The Times Atlas of World History has only 2 pages(!) on American history (a double page spread, so only one map), and the rest is mainly European history. So there certainly is a bit of ignorance about it (in the UK at least). Whether that comes from 'embarrassment', I'm not sure. I'd be interested to know how much it is taught in schools around the world.