BBC TV "WDYTYA?" Series 5 Episode #5: Ainsley Harriott

[Aulus]

 Ainsley Harriott appeared to know very little about slavery. 

I just watched it again and that's not the impression I got.

He'd have to be spectacularly ignorant not to know how and why Black Africans ended up in the Caribbean.

He was extremely angry when faced with a memorial to the man who held his ancestors; was very surprised to find that another ancestor was free-born; and was again angry when it was revealed that his surname comes from a slave owner.

You can be fully aware of all these things (as with the holocaust) but when you're faced with it, face-to-face, in your own ancestry, that's a different thing.  On a different scale, I know full well that TB was a major killer in the late 19th century, but it doesn't make it any more comfortable when I find a great-in-whatever- degree uncle or aunt dies of TB/pthisis in infancy.  Similarly, I know that in the 20th century, meningitis was a killer, but found myself strangely moved when looking up a death for another rootschatter in one of the county forums - born Q2, died Q4 of the same year - and that was something totally unrelated.

[avm228]

I didn't think Ainsley, or Jerry Springer for that matter, appeared ignorant - as has been said above it's not the fact of but the details of their own kin's involvement that comes a surprise and in some cases a shock.

Kizmiaz, this did surprise me:
When I went through school just a few years after he would have, there was no teaching of WW1, WW2, the Slave Trade, the Holocaust or any major world events. These were just not included in the curriculum.

You and I are the same age, and all of these things (plus all sorts of other stuff between 410AD and 1945) were covered in my history education up to leaving school.  We went on a trip to Regensburg concentration camp as part of the Holocaust/WWII curriculum.  I always used to complain that we didn't learn about post-1945 stuff but was told it was too recent to get a historical perspective - looking back I think it's a miracle they got through what they did!  I was lucky enough to have very inspiring history teachers.

Enough about me!

Anna

[kizmiaz]

You and I are the same age, and all of these things (plus all sorts of other stuff between 410AD and 1945) were covered in my history education up to leaving school.  

The history teaching at my school was mostly centred on 18th and 19th century English (not even British!) agricultural history, and included a whole term on the Corn Laws! The only time WW2 was taught was as an option in the 5th year, by which time most pupils had given up on the excrutiatingly boring subject.

But since starting my tree, I am fascinated by history and can't read enough on it.

[silvery]

Yes, you could both be right.  And it's fair comment.

  It's the relating of it to your own families.     Both Jerry and Ainsley appeared deeply moved, and I don't think that appeared false.

My history was all about the industrial revolution, which has much more relevance to me now than it did then.  And also the Napoleonic wars which still bore me to tears.

[Hackstaple]

Kizmiaz

I think that every family history researcher should read a bit of history even if was badly taught at school. How can we understand who we are if we have no idea of what shaped our nation?

I attended school long ago - they did not teach us about the holocaust as it happened whilst I was at school.  But we certainly learned about the slave trade with some discussion of its evils, why and how it arose and who put an end to it - Great Britain and its Navy. Keeping of slaves was common in every culture, in every country over thousands of years. It still occurs today under a mask in China and Saudi Arabia, for example as well as in many West African countries who enslave children for field labour.

Imperialism was practiced by all who had the power and still is even if under different guises.

I am a little disturbed, as are others here, about trends in this series. With the exception of Patsy Kensit we  have so far had people totally overcome by the well-known indignities or horrors that their distant ancestors suffered - or might have suffered had things been different.  Even Patsy seemed to be unaware that London was mostly inhabited by the poor who were often engaged in criminality. David Suchet may yet again take us to the ghettoes and persecutions in Latvia and other parts of Eastern Europe.

I will agree that for family history researchers people who have all their roots in the British Isles are more fascinating but we do not make up nearly all of the Beeb's targeted viewers.

[Aulus]

I will agree that for family history researchers people who have all their roots in the British Isles are more fascinating but we do not make up nearly all of the Beeb's targeted viewers.

I think part of it is that the foreign (hi)stories maybe make better telly.

But your point made me wonder, how representative the current series is of the population (which is, I admit, probably not the same as the Beeb's targeted viewers).   Fortunately summaries of the 2001 census are readily available.  I reproduce the following without comment (other than that Scotland is obviously a different country as far as the census is concerned).

2001 Census

7.9% of the population belonged to a minority ethnic group.  See this table

In England, 3.1 per cent of the population state their religion as Muslim (0.7 per cent in Wales), making this the most common religion after Christianity.

For other religions, 1.1 per cent in England and 0.2 per cent in Wales are Hindu, 0.7 per cent in England and 0.1 per cent in Wales are Sikh, 0.5 per cent in England and 0.1 per cent in Wales are Jewish and 0.3 per cent in England and 0.2 per cent in Wales are Buddhist.

At the time the Census was carried out, there was an internet campaign that encouraged people to answer the religion question "Jedi Knight". The number of people who stated Jedi was 390,000 (0.7 per cent of the population).

Of people living in England, 87.4 per cent gave their country of birth as England and a further 3.2 per cent of the population came from other parts of the UK.
Nearly 97 per cent of the population of Wales were born in the UK, including 75 per cent born in Wales and 20 per cent born in England.

My history education at school concentrated on the Roman period! Next in "importance" (to the teachers presumably) was the period between the Norman invasion and the death of Elizabeth I (but with big gaps here and there).  I remember doing something about the political history of Europe in the run up to WW1 (but not WW2) and the colonial history of Africa up to the Rhodesian UDI.  My O level history was 50:50 Roman Britain and the history of buildings in Britain.  My A Level history was entirely Roman Britain.

[larkspur]

My daughter aged 10(year 6) came home from school on Friday and her history topic this term is.....wait for it......JOHN LENNON. My other daughter aged  13( year 9)   is to study Victorian Murders. Enough said I think!!

[Hasler]

Ainsley, looked shocked about his white ancestor, but seeing the  photo of Ebenezer i thought he looked mixed race before they even told us or Ainsley,

Did anyone else think this ?

[nanny jan]

I did wonder about Ebenezer but thought it might be the condition of the old photograph.

Nanny Jan