Labour Party Reforms Versus Imperialist Literary Practice

The British Quality and Curriculum Authority's 1999 recommendation that history be "taught through sixteen perspectives" is a far cry from the way history was taught in nineteenth-century England (Macleod 21). But those who still cling to the "Old Glory of Empire" want to resuscitate the last century's approach to teaching history to the young. In 1858 J. Birchall insisted that the focus of history for children and young adults be "wars, generals, admirals, the growth of British power," not a "list of petty inventions and puny discoveries" (qtd. in Murrell 37). The schoolteacher was then called upon to be a patriotic teacher of history. As Birchall argued, "it may be said without exaggeration that with them [history teachers] more than with any other body of men lies the future of the Empire. Every year millions of children are passing through our schools, soon to have a voice in ordering the Imperial polity. As they have been taught, so will they act" (qtd. in Murrell 40-41). Chris McGovern, current director of Britain's History Curriculum Association, an opponent of the QCA's recommendation, recently postulated that the proposed changes "will destroy history as a subject that has traditionally given schoolchildren a sense of national identity" (qtd. in Macleod 21). The QCA's sixteen "perspectives" include an ethnic perspective as well as religious, cultural, feminist, and other approaches. McGovern believes that, as a consequence of the QCA's proposal, "children are more likely to learn about what Elizabeth wore than what she did." I would argue that "what Elizabeth wore" is as important in relation to imperialist history as "what she did." In other words, it is about time children learned that the gold adornments in her crown could have come from Africa, or that in 1567 the Queen invested in slaving endeavors (Smedley 72-73), while the royal family became openly involved in the trade in humans in 1663 with the formation of the Company of Royal Adventurers of England in Africa (Ofosu-Appiah 24). Because the British empire extended beyond the confines of the island, an examination of "what Elizabeth wore" could open up a new area of historical inquiry into the cultures and people from whom the gold may have been appropriated. This inquiry is likely to unveil the contribution the colonized people made to the edifice of the empire and expose the contradictions inherent in its maintenance. For those opponents of the revised curriculum, it is as though the days of empire are not over and any other perspective (ethnic or otherwise) that is not "British" is unacceptable.

But this article is not about the opponents of the Labour Party's proposal to teach history through the above-mentioned perspectives. Its main argument is that despite the Labour Party's modest proposal, the actual implementation of these proposals appears problematic, because the tools available to the teacher do not correspond to a multiethnic perspective in the field of children's literature. A critical look at the writings about literature for children reveals that these writings applaud nineteenth-century imperialist "classics," trivialize the white supremacist myths in these old classics--namely those of Henty, Ballantyne, Marryat, Kingston--and mistakenly claim that the imperialist perspectives came and went with an earlier era. Such biased attitudes supposedly make no impact on today's reader. Additionally, today's book critics give new novels that malign Africa the same applause and promotion. I propose to show that what we currently have are proimperialist tools for teachers and librarians, and that the Labour Party's progressive proposal may not, after all, amount to anything.

While we would like to think that Henty, Ballantyne, Marryat, and Kingston were products of their time, today's assessments of their works tend to overlook or dismiss an ethnic perspective. Margery Fisher's The Bright Face of Danger is an example of an endorsement of imperialist classics; her defense of Henty...