Gove’s Controversial History Curriculum (2010-2013): Ideological and Political Use of History Teaching

The Conservative Michael Gove was Secretary of State for Education from 2010 to 2014. From the moment he took office, he proclaimed a mission to end the ‘trashing of our past’, promising to reconnect the nation’s youth with ‘one of the most inspiring stories’ he knew: ‘the history of our United Kingdom’. Therefore he overhauled the History Curriculum and the result was highly controversial. We are particularly interested in the reason(s) why lively debates happened and on which elements the debates will focus. Our analysis focused on elements of controversy between Michael Gove and the teaching profession and university history professors. A series of observations were made. These observations relate firstly to the arguments developed by Michael Gove, who portrays the situation of history teaching as a subject in crisis and proposes the review of the curriculum as a solution, whereas historians' opinions focus on other measures. We also found that Gove points to some evidence of an improvement in history in the classroom, but unlike historians his arguments are political, ideological and non-educational. In the end, the controversies clearly focused on the purpose of history in relation to the strengthening of British identity.