RootsChat.Com
General => The Common Room => The Lighter Side => Topic started by: Mowsehowse on Thursday 08 December 16 21:01 GMT (UK)
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Wow!!
I thought that was absolutely fascinating all the way through.
And Ms Bonnin really behaved in a sensible manner.
Excellent!
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Best one yet - and what a fabulous place Martinique is, the views! stunning.
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Great episode! So much information!! :D
Could have done without the tears - but at least the reactions were genuine.
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Loved it, I'd love to go to Martinique it looked stunning.
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The West Indies are such a melting pot, particularly the former British colonies, where, post-emancipation, indentured labour was introduced, first from India, then China and Madeira.
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Was brilliant! I loved the episode. I had had no idea who she was but she came across really well.
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Superb programme. My OH and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
I never knew anything about the history of this area of slavery; that other countries as well as England were involved.
Tourism will rise in 2017 for Martinique, I'm sure.
A truly delightful and intelligent lady was Liz Bonnin.
Judy
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The more programmes such as WDYTYA I watch the more amazed I am that people seem to be so uneducated about history, it makes me glad I was educated in Scotland. ;)
The slave trade is a case in point people these days seem to think the slave trade was some scheme dreamed up by plantation owners to provide labour in the various types of plantation.
They do not seem to realise that slavery and the slave trade has been going on since almost the dawn of time and has involved almost every nationality, religion and culture and though now illegal in every country still exists today.
Conquering or more powerful peoples would enslave those they conquered or held power over.
To put it simply this was played out in Africa when tribes raided the villages of other tribes and took villagers as their slaves at a later date such captives were sold on to English, French and Dutch traders to work the plantations. It could be argued that if it was not for the help of various tribes or peoples in Africa the Atlantic slave trade could not have existed.
Cheers
Guy
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The more programmes such as WDYTYA I watch the more amazed I am that people seem to be so uneducated about history, it makes me glad I was educated in Scotland. ;)
The slave trade is a case in point people these days seem to think the slave trade was some scheme dreamed up by plantation owners to provide labour in the various types of plantation.
They do not seem to realise that slavery and the slave trade has been going on since almost the dawn of time and has involved almost every nationality, religion and culture and though now illegal in every country still exists today.
Conquering or more powerful peoples would enslave those they conquered or held power over.
To put it simply this was played out in Africa when tribes raided the villages of other tribes and took villagers as their slaves at a later date such captives were sold on to English, French and Dutch traders to work the plantations. It could be argued that if it was not for the help of various tribes or peoples in Africa the Atlantic slave trade could not have existed.
Cheers Guy
Fair point Guy. Slavery is about domination, often after warfare, but the actual concept remains unpalatable.
I think I can empathise with finding it difficult to swallow in the family tree..... and one has to hope at least some owners were benign.
But in an era where every woman and all she owned, became the possession of her husband upon marriage, the idea of slavery takes on a slightly different perspective doesn't it?
ADDED: I fear most Apprenticeship arrangements were slavery too.
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Was brilliant! I loved the episode. I had had no idea who she was but she came across really well.
Like you pharma I had no idea who she was either but really enjoyed the episode best one yet
Rosie :)
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The more programmes such as WDYTYA I watch the more amazed I am that people seem to be so uneducated about history, it makes me glad I was educated in Scotland. ;)
The slave trade is a case in point people these days seem to think the slave trade was some scheme dreamed up by plantation owners to provide labour in the various types of plantation.
They do not seem to realise that slavery and the slave trade has been going on since almost the dawn of time and has involved almost every nationality, religion and culture and though now illegal in every country still exists today.
Conquering or more powerful peoples would enslave those they conquered or held power over.
To put it simply this was played out in Africa when tribes raided the villages of other tribes and took villagers as their slaves at a later date such captives were sold on to English, French and Dutch traders to work the plantations. It could be argued that if it was not for the help of various tribes or peoples in Africa the Atlantic slave trade could not have existed.
Cheers
Guy
I don't think I would consider any RCers unaware of history, just perhaps know more about certain periods of history than other. I completely agree that slavery has been around for a very long time, after all it is referred to in the Bible.
I also cannot agree with the idea that being educated in Scotland guarantees good historical knowledge. Some conversations I have had with colleagues at work show that many people (in Scotland) have no clue even about recent history or world affairs for that matter. For example: on the day of the Queen's 90th birthday celebrations we had the TV on at work. My colleague who is 3 yrs older than me and aware of my age said "I don't like her, give me one good reason why she didn't fight in WW1?" I said "well for a start she wasn't born yet, secondly women didn't tend to serve on the front line back then although nurses could get quite close thanks to moving front lines, anyway she served in WW2" colleague replied "well how was I supposed to know that, it's ok for you I didn't live through the war". Another colleague didn't know who Fidel Castro was, another asked where they got the idea for "the crusade thing story line in Robin Hood Prince of Thieves". I could go on, but won't.
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;) Oh dear, ParmaT....
Not sure if I should laugh or cry!!!!!!!!!
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Hello,
I am Scottish and I'm neither laughing nor crying.
Rootschat is supposed to be a friendly forum where people can help each other. I would find "pharma T's" completely uncalled for remarks about Scottish intelligence extremely offensive, except they display, on a world-wide, public forum, his/her own total lack of intelligence, manners.... (I too could go on and on)
Regards, Dorothy.
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I was replying to Guy's post which implied all Scottish educated people knew a lot about history which I believe to be incorrect. I believe a lack of historical knowledge is down to induvidualsee paying no attention to what they are taught about history and current affair rather than a product of where they were educated.
I myself Scottish. I'm truly sorry my words have been seen as offensive. I was not trying to say that Scottish people are stupid as my words appear to have been taken to mean. I was trying to illustrate that anyone any where can be ignorant of certain areas of knowledge.
Obviously I can add a complete inability to put my point across effectively to my complete lack of manners and intelligence I shall now remove myself from RC and try and remove myself from society. Although this may take a few attempt as due to my lack of intelligence and ability I've failed in the past.
I
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Don't go, PharmaT. All you were doing was respond with a set of examples to counterract a sweeping generalisation about different education systems. Both sets of examples were anecdotal, but of equal validity.
As it happens I was equally surprised by the original post from ankerdine, but it isn't anything to do with intelligence. Bing interested in history, and having had some success in quizzes in the past, I am often surprised but try to remember that there are huge areas of knowledge which I know nothing about. My view is that you should never be embarrassed about not knowing something you never learned, nor should you be proud of it.
Unfortunately, being an arrogant b***** I still shout at contestants on the television.
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Hello pharmaT,
Guy's tongue in cheek remark was probably in answer to the following remark from Reply 6.
"I never knew anything about the history of this area of slavery, that other countries as well as ENGLAND were involved".
Not notice?
Regards, Dorothy.
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Hello,
I am Scottish and I'm neither laughing nor crying.
Rootschat is supposed to be a friendly forum where people can help each other. I would find "pharma T's" completely uncalled for remarks about Scottish intelligence extremely offensive, except they display, on a world-wide, public forum, his/her own total lack of intelligence, manners.... (I too could go on and on)
Regards, Dorothy.
And it's remarks like this that cause more problems than it solves!
You must be overly sensitive, as I read no such sleight into pharmaT's comment whatsoever.
She was simply pointing out the an education gained in Scotland is no guarantee of intelligence and knowledge.
And you, ironically, have simply proved her point! >:(
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Rootschat is supposed to be a friendly forum where people can help each other. I would find "pharma T's" completely uncalled for remarks about Scottish intelligence extremely offensive,
First: Rootschat IS a friendly forum where people help each other
Second: I cant see any remarks by PharmaT about Scottish Intelligence - I can see a comment that being educated in Scotland does not guarantee a good knowledge of history. That , I would say, is a fair point. I can also see some amusing examples of comments made by people generally who haven't got a good knowledge of History.
I cant see anything about Scottish intelligence?
Don't go Pharma!
And well said KGarrad (red writing came up while I was typing)
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I really enjoyed this episode. It was very captivating. Liz seemed very genuine and took each step at a time like family historians do. She wasn't thrown way back in time straight away, missing lots of ancestors, which probably made this episode really good!
This series has been very enjoyable thus far and I hope it continues! :D
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First: Rootschat IS a friendly forum where people help each other
Second: I cant see any remarks by PharmaT about Scottish Intelligence - I can see a comment that being educated in Scotland does not guarantee a good knowledge of history. That , I would say, is a fair point. I can also see some amusing examples of comments made by people generally who haven't got a good knowledge of History.
I agree Liz. However, it isn't just Scotland, I think in general, historical knowledge isn't that good - you only have to watch some of the quiz shows to see how lacking some very intelligent people are about the history of their own country. I know from my own education, there were large periods of history that were missed out. It's only as I got older that I began to fill in those gaps for myself by reading or watching programmes about them.
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I agree this was a brilliant programme. I have enjoyed the whole series so far. However although I consider myself fairly well educated, and knew all about the slave trade, I had no idea that large numbers of Indians came to the West Indies as indentured servants :)
You are never too old to learn something new!
PS I too am surprised by the lack of historical knowledge in some of my contempories and agree with Pharma t that education has little to do with it, rather more the attention span when we were being taught, and subsequently the desire to learn more.
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I think even with the best education in the world you can't avoid being ignorant of large chunks of history. There is a lot of it after all.
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I am sorry that my post has caused problems. I had no idea that French plantation owners in Martinique were involved in the slave trade. I have of course heard about the trade routes using Bristol and Liverpool, west Africa and the southern states of the USA.
Sadly I did not choose to continue with History at school and chose a different route, though nowadays I wish I had continued with the subject.
This episode of WDYTYA was one of the most interesting and colourful of the series so far.
I am learning new things every day especially through this site! :)
Judy
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Just for balance about general ignorance, a couple of facts which are not widely known, and to demonstrate my potential ignorance I haven't checked them so I'm open to correction:
Denmark ended its slave trading before Britain did, but doesn't shout about it.
And I think that when Liz Bonnin's earliest Desormeaux ancestor recognised his children by his ex-slave partner all slaves in French possessions were free after the Revolution. Napoleon decided to restore slavery shortly after.
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I missed this episode, but having heard everyone's comments, I must catch up with it. Admittedly, I'm quite ignorant when it comes to the slave trade, and some other periods in history as well... I can't blame my education, surely our education continues after we leave school, and our curiosity should lead us to continue learning as adults?
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I acquired most of my historical knowledge through taking an interest rather than being taught it at school. I'm still learning. I was aware that people from Asia went to other British colonies but wasn't aware of the details. It's interesting how people's attitudes to slavery and Empire changed over time. Today's accepted status quo is tomorrow's embarrassment.
Blue
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This was played out in Africa when tribes raided the villages of other tribes and took villagers as their slaves at a later date such captives were sold on to English, French and Dutch traders to work the plantations. It could be argued that if it was not for the help of various tribes or peoples in Africa the Atlantic slave trade could not have existed.
I think people used to know this - I did and I'm 75 - but the PC brigade seemed to have wiped it from history so that people and dare I say it, especially Europeans, no longer have any knowledge of this.
Anyway, wherever people were educated, whether they learned a lot of history or a little, it was a very good programme. I wonder if it would have been possible to trace the family of the oldest ancestor they found who was born in France, it would have been interesting to see what kind of a family he came from.
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I was also interested to see that her Indian forebears took a "western" name in addition to their given name, but that no family name was used. I recall that during my time in British Guiana in the 1950s, many locals of Indian extraction, caste unknown, used only one given name, but others, including the "rebel", whose actions had caused us to to be posted there, also some well-known sportsmen (Sonny Ramadhin) had both given and family names.
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I think many of us, when we discover slave owners, or Slave Ship Captains, in our ancestry, feel rather uncomfortable, to say the least.
Most of us have, even if we didn't start off with a good grasp of History, gained a great deal more of knowledge of world history as our researching develops.
I've always regarded a good education, wherever it is gained, as being more about knowing, or being able to work out where to find information, than having a sort of haversack of facts concealed about one's person, learned in youth and unmodified in later life! Surely one learns some new thing each day - and many of us say / do something totally unintentionally that pops us into an awkward situation from time to time. If anyone's education stopped the day they left University, that would be so sad.
I've recorded this episode, and am really looking forward to watching it. All I knew of the woman previously was the impression from a few chance sightings of programmes of a rather "talking down" popular science presenter, who I always felt was aiming at the "Yoof" market. It sounds as if she has a far richer hinterland than that.
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I was replying to Guy's post which implied all Scottish educated people knew a lot about history which I believe to be incorrect. I believe a lack of historical knowledge is down to induvidualsee paying no attention to what they are taught about history and current affair rather than a product of where they were educated.
I myself Scottish. I'm truly sorry my words have been seen as offensive. I was not trying to say that Scottish people are stupid as my words appear to have been taken to mean. I was trying to illustrate that anyone any where can be ignorant of certain areas of knowledge.
Obviously I can add a complete inability to put my point across effectively to my complete lack of manners and intelligence I shall now remove myself from RC and try and remove myself from society. Although this may take a few attempt as due to my lack of intelligence and ability I've failed in the past.
I
PharmaT, I was not commenting about Rootschatters but was commenting on the lack of knowledge displayed by Liz Bonnin.
From what I heard she had some knowledge that her ancestors could have owned slaves yet it seems she did not take time to do any basic research on the subject of slavery.
That is where the Scottish education system comes into play; unlike the English system the Scottish system tends to teach children how to discover information for themselves rather than being taught facts and figures.
That style of education allows the pupil to carry on learning after he/she has left school and indeed throughout the rest of their life.
However as you say not all people take advantage of the education they receive.
Cheers
Guy
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I think many of us, when we discover slave owners, or Slave Ship Captains, in our ancestry, feel rather uncomfortable, to say the least.
Most of us have, even if we didn't start off with a good grasp of History, gained a great deal more of knowledge of world history as our researching develops.
I think it is good that we are finding it, and that it's not being swept under the carpet.
I've wondered about the British economy at the time and the improvement in lifestyle with the industrial revolution. I don't think the industry magnates would have become as wealthy as they did without the very cheap raw materials that were produced on plantations, so the use of slaves was financially benefitting many people that you wouldn't consider to be involved in the slave trade.
I've known for quite some time that family members were planters. I was more surprised to find that the cousin of the wife of one of them was very involved in abolishing slavery.
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I enjoyed the program
I had seen her on TV though I couldn't remember where. wildlife programs so that would be it.
These sort of program where the subject is such a variety of ethnic origins often provide a good watch
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I think Liz Bonnin joined forces with Professor Brian Cox and Dara O'briain on some of those very successful science programmes on the BBC.
She is a television presenter with a very clear voice and explains complicated theories very well.
Judy
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I loved Liz Bonnin's programme.
The really special part was where her Slave owner ancestor had a slave partner and the offspring of this union also did the same. The marriage certificate & 6 children was an eyeopener.
On the slave front, Oliver Cromwell had Irish people sent to Barbados to work on Plantations
circa 1650. They were nicknamed Red legs because they got sun burnt easily.
jfch
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She is on TV right now on operation snow tiger
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I thought the programme was one of the best I have seen. I have seen Liz Bonnin on TV and wonderered what her ancestry was, the programme told that excellently. Ancestors from Africa, India and France, brought together in the Americas. Truly a citizen of the world. The descendant of slaves and slave owners, who are we to judge the values of 150 years ago?
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I had/have no idea who she is.... and then I found it to be the most boring episode ever.
I lost the will to live somewhere and just stopped watching it. That point occurred when she met some woman who explained something ... and I had NO idea what on earth she was saying, due to her accent - and the programme didn't then summarise it in English ... so I couldn't be 4rsed to continue watching any more.
We all have our "pet hates" - and this was one of them.
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Do you not have a subtitles button on your Tv doof, I find this useful at times. ;)
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All I knew of the woman previously was the impression from a few chance sightings of programmes of a rather "talking down" popular science presenter, who I always felt was aiming at the "Yoof" market. It sounds as if she has a far richer hinterland than that.
I am disappointed in you. My husband (77) and I (71) have enjoyed Liz Bonnin's various programmes during the past few years.
However you are correct when you state that you continue to learn after normal education ends.
Are we the new "Yoof" then?
Judy
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Do you not have a subtitles button on your Tv doof, I find this useful at times. ;)
There is possibly a button for that on the remote, except I don't know which one it is and the letters are tiny and most are gone/rubbed off. In any case .... I can't read sub-titles from where I sit as I sit 12' from the tiny portable telly .... so no chance of reading those. If I'm REALLY interested in a programme that provides its own sub-titles, I go and crouch by the telly until they've finished (rare, but possible).
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Stanleys, maybe you should be kind to yourself and get a new Tv for Christmas ;) all that crouching near the set, cannot be doing your knees much good ??? After all you pay the same licence fee whatever the state of your set........ :D
Modified after some thought :o
Nothing I have said above is meant with any sarcasm, nastiness, offensiveness :-[