The Other Minister (was Re: Is Umbridge a commentary on British govt. ed

[or.phan_ann]

snapes_witch wrote:
>
> > Tonks:
> > Don't know about Umbridge. But I thought that "the Other Minister" 
> > was Tony Blair and he was waiting for a phone call from President
> > Bush. I am sure that was be a commentary on the U.S. president.  
> > And I loved  it!!! "that horrible man".
> > 
> > Tonks_op
> >
> 
> That was my first thought too, but the timeline isn't right.  HBP 
> starts the summer of 1996 and Blair didn't become PM until the next 
> spring, and of course Bill Clinton was president then.

Ann:
Yes, JKR's just being 1990s/2000s anachronistic again. But if we play
the game of All-Canon-Is-Accurate, it's obvious who the PM is: Neil
Kinnock. (Wikipedia link for non-Britons:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_general_election%2C_1992)
(His predecessor is John Major, but I'm not sure who the
redecorator/Chancellor is.) Come on, it's only a small change...

> Carol:
> I raised a couple of questions about Umbridge on the main list that
> I hoped someone would respond to here, but not a peep. What I'd like
> to know is whether British readers think that Umbridge is a        
> caricature of Margaret Thatcher (whom JKR evidently didn't like).  
 > I'd also like to know whether Hermione's remark, "It means the    
 > Ministry is ("are," if you'r British) interfering at Hogwarts," has
> any bearing on government interference in British schools, "public"
> or otherwise.

Ann:
I didn't see that on main, sorry. (Did you mention Umbridge's blood
status?) Anyway, she's not a Thatcher avatar; if she was, she wouldn't
be all pink fluffy cardigans and kittens, and she'd've been revealed
to be a Dalek or a vampire in disguise. Or a dragon. Or Voldemort. 

As to Ministry interference... I didn't think of this until you asked,
 but there's a general perception of the government pressuring schools
to teach core subjects (especially English and maths ["math" if you're
a degenerate colonial]) to improve test results, and in general only
teach things pupils will be tested on, rather than other cool stuff.
(One of the main measures for GCSE success is 5 A*-C grades including
English and maths, hence my examples.) There's not much conflict over
what exactly gets taught, IMO, as the intelligent design/evolution
debate in the US. There has been a bit lately with sponsors of "city
academies" being allowed to decide what's on the syllabus, but I think
that's too recent to be a target.

Ann