Ask students around the world, and they will tell you why the British flag looks the way it does. It is a combination of the flags of three of the nations making up the United Kingdom: England, Scotland and Northern Ireland. 

That might give the impression that these nations just merged harmoniouslyIn a friendly and peaceful way. into one. But the reality is quite different. Ireland and Wales were both invaded and Scotland agreed to unite with England because it was bankruptUnable to pay one's debt..

So scratch the surface, and the history of the United Kingdom is not one of harmony at all. At least, that is what Union, a new TV series by public historian David Olusoga, is trying to persuade people.

Olusoga says his aim is to teach people British history in a way that makes them feel uncomfortable. History, he insists, is not there to make us feel happy or special.

Olusoga was born in Lagos in 1970 to a White British mother and a Nigerian father. He moved to Gateshead, his mother's hometown, when he was a child. 

The family experienced racism - a brick was thrown through their window. He went on to study history at university. 

He was proud of his Nigerian YorubaA language mainly spoken in southwestern Nigeria and Benin. heritage, and of his mother's White working class GeordiePeople from Tyneside/Newcastle in North East England. background. But he also knew he had a third identity: Black British. "That had no history, no recognition" he recalls. 

As an adult, and by now a renowned historian and presenter, he decided to tell the story of that history himself. 

In 2016, he published Black and British: A Forgotten History, which was then made into a TV series. It goes back as far as the first meeting of the people of Britain and the people of Africa in Roman times, discusses Britain's role in the slave trade and Olusoga's own childhood.

Yes: Any truthful account of history will tell that it is full of conflict and brutality. We have to face up to that because it is what has made the modern world an unjust place.

No: The more we tell ourselves that our history is full of bloodshed and savagery, the less we will trust each other in the present. It is better to focus on the things that unite us.

Or... The problem is that we believe we are defined by our history. Saying our history is full of cruelty feels tantamount to saying that we are too. We should break with our past and define ourselves by the present.