Narrative, Memory and History Education in Divided Cyprus: A Comparison of Schoolbooks on the "History of Cyprus"

Journal article

Papadakis, Yiannis (2008) Narrative, Memory and History Education in Divided Cyprus: A Comparison of Schoolbooks on the "History of Cyprus", History & Memory 20 (2): 128–148.

Download Final publication
.pdf

This is the Version of Record of the publication, available here in accordance with the publisher’s self-archiving policy. This version is free to view and download for private research and study only. This publication may be subject to copyright: please visit the publisher’s website for details. All rights reserved.

Read the article here

Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot history schoolbooks adopted a similar model of ethnic nationalism focusing on the suffering of the Self and presenting an essentialist, unchanging view of national identity. However, the new books that recently appeared on the Turkish Cypriot side follow a social-constructivist model of history, which presents nationalism and national identity as emerging under specific historical conditions rather than as given. They avoid homogenizing assumptions by presenting internal differentiations, and indicate instances of internal violence and suffering of others. These changes have significant implications regarding notions of blame and trauma, and allow for identity to emerge as a political choice.

An error has occurred. This application may no longer respond until reloaded. Reload 🗙