Irish Myths through History's Mirror
The continuing struggle in Ireland, and the atrocities which it produces within Great Britain, are given full attention by the media.
What I wish to propose here is that education practices within both states are designed to make an understanding of each other, and of the fundamental reasons for the problems, as difficult as possible.
Traditional British schools teach Greek, Roman and early English literature but ignore that of ancient Ireland, while many of their more progressive counterparts don't bother with classical literature at all. British schools and universities normally consider the recent phases of the Irish question' (from 1801) while making plain that its origins lie somewhere in the early modern period. Yet courses dealing with the Tudors and Stuarts in the same institutions normally ignore Ireland more or less completely. Irish schools tend to present their nation's history as a long struggle between a homogeneous Gaelic, Catholic Ireland and Norman or English invaders, which still continues. Both attitudes are dangerously misleading.
Traditional British schools teach Greek, Roman and early English literature but ignore that of ancient Ireland, while many of their more progressive counterparts don't bother with classical literature at all. British schools and universities normally consider the recent phases of the Irish question' (from 1801) while making plain that its origins lie somewhere in the early modern period. Yet courses dealing with the Tudors and Stuarts in the same institutions normally ignore Ireland more or less completely. Irish schools tend to present their nation's history as a long struggle between a homogeneous Gaelic, Catholic Ireland and Norman or English invaders, which still continues. Both attitudes are dangerously misleading.
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