港英時代中國歷史科和歷史科教科書對香港淪陷史論述匱乏情況初探

本文探討二戰結束至九七回歸之間，香港中學中國歷史科和歷史科（下稱兩史）教科書如何處理有關香港淪陷及日治的本地歷史問題。在搜羅 1945 年至 1997 年間香港初中及高中課程中國歷史科和歷史科有關二戰的篇章，以及上世紀 60 年代以來香港政府教育部門的課程發展檔案後，梳理出戰後數十年間對香港淪陷論述的變化。因為高中課程有公開考試的限制，淪陷議題主要在兩史的初中課本之中。其中發展趨勢是從完全漠視，到漸在注釋、圖片、教師用書粗略交代，再到以正文正面論述。在文獻分析和對重要持份者訪談的基礎下，本文歸納兩史教科書略過本地淪陷史不談的原因，並非是港英政府有刻意隱諱的政策，而是跟教科書作者忽視本地歷史，以及作「不談政治」的自我審查有關。至於史學教育界對兩史加入日治等香港史內容有強烈要求，大抵是回歸前港人主體意識覺醒的結果，才最終令這個備受冷落的歷史議題，正式成為香港史學教育的一部分。

This article enquired how the textbooks of the subjects of Chinese History and History for the Hong Kong secondary schools had presented the Fall of Hong Kong (1941–1945) during the Post-World War II British Colonial Rule (1945–1997). After collecting all available textbooks found in the libraries of Hong Kong, as well as the archival materials of the Hong Kong colonial government, it is obvious that the problem of absorbing the Fall of Hong Kong or not happened mainly in the lower form secondary textbooks of the two history subjects. The developmental trend of the inclusion of the topic could be described as from completely ignoring, to discussing in the footnotes, photos, and the teacher’s manuals, and to eventually putting these issues into the text in the few years before the Handover. Buttressed by interviews with important stakeholders, the key observation to the reasons behind the silence of the history textbooks on those main local historical events during World War II is that there was no official policies of the colonial government to hide the embarrassing defeats of the British Empire from the newer generations of Hong Kong; rather, it was more possible the result of Sino-centrism and self-censorship of the textbook authors. Thanks to the strong demand of inclusion of local topics to the secondary history education in the 1990s, which is arguably the result of the awakening of the Hong Kong citizens to discover their ownership to the future Special Administrative Region, the Fall has finally incorporated into the history education in Hong Kong.