English Textbooks and Foreign Complaints

The normal English reaction to proposals for international textbook revision is one of complacency. Our history teaching and textbooks are uniquely free from official pressures, and anxious to avoid bias; and foreigners frequently compliment us on our “fairplay.” We therefore tend to assume that British textbooks, at least, are scrupulous and impartial.

So, up to a point, they are; and yet foreign critics find plenty in them to condemn. During the past six years we have exchanged history textbooks with Germany, Denmark and France, and from all three countries have come complaints varying from small details to wholesale denunciation of our entire approach to history and history-teaching.