We’re all sitting here looking at a critical and terrible moment in the United States, and I think one of the reasons that it’s affected me so much is my memory of the racism of the 1980s. And the thing that inspired me more than anything was the idea of doing history on TV.
[15] He received his medal from the Queen in January 2019. By the time he was 14, the National Front had attacked his house on more than one occasion, requiring police protection for him and his family.
When asked by Radio 4’s Today programme about whether the British Museum ought to have left the bust of its founding father Sir Hans Sloane in place, only with a … He’d see that there’s not much I do now that I didn’t do when I was younger. Mahmoud, whose parents are Egyptian, also expressed reservations about the connotations of British colonialism, such as “massacres, subjugation and destruction of rich and proud cultures”. [4] At five years old, Olusoga migrated to the UK with his mother and grew up in Gateshead, Tyne and Wear. Should we feel shame? There was racism from my schoolteachers, from bus drivers, from the people I passed in the street. Is there such a thing as too much love and loss on social media? The Covid restrictions quiz: Can you beat Boris and answer these questions? As far as my younger self was concerned, the epitome of cool, apart from playing the guitar and being good at martial arts, was knowing about history and travelling around the world.
At home, where my mother brought me up along with lots of siblings, it was different. David Olusoga, 50, who lives in Bristol, is best known for presenting A House Through Time on BBC2.
David Olusoga: ‘We should look at the empire for what it was.’. He is Professor of Public History at the University of Manchester.
Series three continues on … The North East was going through a very dark time in the 1980s, and neither I, nor the other kids around me, had any real flights of fancy around our careers. He wrote in the Guardian: “It reminds me of slavery, it reminds me of thousands of years of brutality, it reminds me of how my foremothers were raped and my forefathers brutalised.”, “Benjamin Zephaniah OBE – no way Mr Blair, no way Mrs Queen. Presented last week by the charismatic David Olusoga, who was born in Lagos of a Nigerian father and a British mother, the one-hour programme traced the history of the modern African novel, starting with the revolutionary Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe.
David Adetayo Olusoga OBE (born January 1970[1]) is a British historian, writer, broadcaster, presenter and film-maker. “I don’t believe we should have this ledger book, this balancing-scales view of the empire,” Olusoga told the Radio Times. We rely on advertising to help fund our award-winning journalism. He parents are multi-raced as his father is Nigerian and his mother is of British nationality.
Was it bad? [8], Olusoga began his TV career behind the camera, first as a researcher on the 1999 BBC series Western Front.
I love music, I love fitness and I love history, and I don’t do very much else. So he’d be thrilled to have written a book sometimes likened to that one. In 2015 it was announced that he would co-present Civilisations, a sequel to Kenneth Clark's 1969 television documentary series Civilisation, alongside the historians Mary Beard and Simon Schama. He was cited for his services to history and community integration. I’m profoundly dyslexic, so I really struggled with reading and writing. We asked the historian and presenter, 50, what his younger self would make of his life, and how his childhood helped shape him. “Whoever is behind this offer can never have read any of my work.”. David Olusoga (Born on January 5, 1970) is the host of many historical TV documentary shows. She’s seen the books of mine on the shelves, and she had this wonderful, childish question: “Did you write all these words?” When you’re a kid, it does seem like an impossibility to write a whole book, and I would have been stunned to see my name on the spine of one. It was very important to my younger self because it told the story of people like him.
[17] Olusoga gave his inaugural professorial lecture on "Identity, Britishness and the Windrush" at the University of Manchester in May 2019. The Order of the British Empire, like all other official honours of the British state, is problematic for many people of minority descent because of its links to the systematic domination, racist violence and genocide employed by the British in Africa, America, Asia and Australasia from the 17th century onwards. At five years old, Olusoga migrated to the UK with his mother and grew up in Gateshead, Tyne and Wear. The latest offers and discount codes from popular brands on Telegraph Voucher Codes, 'My relationship with my younger self is enormously changed, as it is with all people, by having a child', The young Olusoga loved music, history and martial arts, There's nothing 'inappropriate' about grieving online like Chrissy Teigen and John Legend. Should we feel pride? I had a difficult time as a child, but that never stopped me feeling extraordinarily, firmly northern. I would be astonished and pleased and moved to see that my book Black and British has sometimes been compared to a book called Staying Power, which was published in the 1980s and was the first big, encyclopedic examination of black British history.
In his era, the mother and father of Davi split the united kingdom along together with his mum. He was one of a very few non-white people living on a council estate. They were eventually forced to leave as a result of the racism.
[6][7] He later attended the University of Liverpool to study the history of slavery. [10], Subsequently he became a television presenter, beginning in 2014 with The World's War: Forgotten Soldiers of Empire, about the Indian, African and Asian troops who fought in the First World War, followed by several other documentaries and appearances on BBC One television's The One Show. Olusoga’s recent comments on his OBE come days after Mohammed Mahmoud, imam at the Finsbury Park mosque, accepted the same award in recognition of his actions after the terror attack on worshippers there in 2017.
Did his mom and dad are faced by David ‘ separation, but however, in addition, he must have the annoyance to be born shameful. More on his Wiki-Bio, he was born to a Nigerian father and a British mother. It felt like two alternate worlds were pulling against each other: a school of low expectations and a mother who went out of her way to convince her children they could do what they wanted. Olusoga, a member of the board of the Scott Trust, which publishes the Guardian, has written extensively on the the development of empire and the history of black people in Britain, including their involvement in the British military.
Thanks to her, I got to university, and finally, after that, I asked myself what I’m sure teenagers from more advantaged backgrounds had been asking much earlier: what do you really want to do? But if you decline, then you should shut up about it and I had to ask myself the question – would I?”. [2], Also a writer, Olusoga has written stand-alone history books as well as ones to accompany his TV series. They were eventually forced to leave as a result of the racism. I’d like to say that my younger self would look at the Britain of 2020 and be surprised and relieved and impressed by how things have changed, and I don’t live with the level of violence I used to, but I still get followed around in shops by security guards, I still see black people, particularly young black people, being treated with suspicion, and I still have to interact with people who show me an incredible level of hostility. He would be astonished and pleased that I’ve written books and made TV shows. Historian says he recognises British imperial past had ‘terrible, terrible episodes’, Last modified on Tue 25 Aug 2020 10.43 BST. Likewise, he comes from a mixed ethnical group of Black and White. He’d be amazed, and quite humbled, to know that I’d go on to do anything like that. “I think we should look at the empire for what it was, this complicated, more-than-400-year story with terrible, terrible episodes. I’d seen Michael Wood do it on the BBC in a way that was quite revolutionary. Paul Gascoigne and a couple of others made it as footballers, but the rest of us were essentially being warehoused for a future that was going to be a low-skilled job, an unskilled job, or the dole. He picked up his medal from the palace in January, when the Queen handed out her new year honours. We urge you to turn off your ad blocker for The Telegraph website so that you can continue to access our quality content in the future. By the time he was 14, the National Front had attacked his house on more than one occasion, requiring police protection for him and his family. David Olusoga's Wiki-like Bio; Parents, Family, Height The multitalented historian was born as David Adetayo Olusoga in 1970 in Lagos, Nigeria. When the poet Benjamin Zephaniah refused the same honour in 2003 for his services to literature, he said he got angry just to hear the word “empire”. Series three continues on Tuesday (BBC Two, 9pm). I’m teaching my daughter football and guitar, even though one day she’ll be amazed by my nerve trying to coach her. [18], In response to the global Black Lives Matter movement with protests sparked by the killing of George Floyd, Olusoga's Black and British: A Forgotten History was re-broadcast on the BBC and made available on BBC Player along with several other documentaries fronted by him. Olusoga, a professor of history at the University of Manchester, has a Nigerian father. The overt racism I grew up with isn’t a regular experience in my life anymore, and thank God for that, but my younger self would probably still consider it a realistic grounding. He is the author of the 2016 book Black and British: A Forgotten History, which was awarded both the Longman–History Today Trustees Award 2017 and the PEN Hessell-Tiltman Prize 2017. Not only did David face his parents' separation, but he also got to experience the pain of being born black. [5] He was one of a very few non-white people living on a council estate. I never presumed it would go away. He was also a contributor to the Oxford Companion to Black British History, and has written for The Guardian, The Observer, New Statesman and BBC History magazine;[11] since June 2018 he has been a member of the board of the Scott Trust, which publishes The Guardian. Every black British person my age will recall it. 2017: Honorary Degree of Doctor of Letters, 2015: World War One Book of the Year at the, This page was last edited on 1 October 2020, at 16:15. She and my aunt, who’s a teacher, home-schooled me, and once I’d grasped the mechanical skills I was able to get somewhere. Using that word ‘empire’ does make it a difficult award to accept. My relationship with my younger self is enormously changed, as it is with all people, by having a child. Olusoga, a professor of history at the University of Manchester, has a Nigerian father. He’d have expected me to be a far, far more accomplished guitar player than I am, and he’d be appalled that I’m not a professional karate instructor, but he’d be pleased I exercise every day and can still bench-press my body weight – the things that matter. David Olusoga, the historian and broadcaster, has said he was pleased to be awarded an OBE, while also feeling troubled by the brutal history of the British empire. I am profoundly anti-empire,” he said. [13][14], He was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in the 2019 New Year Honours for services to history and to community integration. In a Guardian article days later, he revealed that the “exhilarating and humbling news” of his award was tempered by the soul-searching over the “extractive, exploitative, racist and violent” nature of the empire.