ABSTRACT
A history of English is too bold an undertaking to be attempted in a short compass. The issue is one of scale. English has been developed as a subject, in different ways and with different purposes in different sectors of British education, across two centuries. Something of this scale and of these different courses of development needs to be retained in understanding the evolution of the subject. The problem is how much. Our focus here is on curriculum development and research in post-war years, against the wider background of the 19th century foundation of the subject. The price is some omission of detail in describing recent changes. But we hope that our approach provides a context for understanding issues presently facing English teaching, and contributes a perspective that emphasizes the importance of curriculum-oriented research.
