Over 40 leading British trade unionists and personalities want the Education Secretary to rethink his proposals to axe Crimean war heroine Mary Seacole and abolitionist Olaudah Equiano as required study in UK schools.
In the open letter to the Education Secretary, the signatories told Michael Gove that it would be 'historically and culturally incorrect to remove them'. Zita Holbourne, who has helped to organize the campaign, says their inclusion is for the benefit of everyone.
Campaigners say they are worried what the removal of these two black figures say about British history. Should it be, they argue, male, pale and stale? In other words, a history of old, white men told with a particular bias in mind. In summer where British multiculturalism was celebrated with Jessica Ennis and Mo Farah having their achievements applauded there should be more figures of history, not fewer.
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Updated Dec 22th, 2022
Being from the UK this makes me mad, this isn't even black history this is British history, if you talk to a random person on the street in England no matter what colour they don't even know that black people lived in England before the windrush, and there were black communities in England in the 18th century that is crazy, instead of excluding Mary Seacole and Oludah Equiano whose story is so amazing I don't know why a film hasn't been done on him, they should include more. Actions speak louder than words and nothing speaks louder than this in showing you what White British people especially the ones at the top really think of black people. I love History and always have and became disillusioned in school when I spent two G.C.S.E years learning about World War 2, how can you spend 2 years focusing on the suffering of Jews which lasted 6 years and nothing on the suffering of Africans, that lasted 400 years especially when the country your in reaped the benefits of this.
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