Construction of Collective Memory Through Official History Education in North Cyprus

Abstract

Fundamental to recalling memories and remembering is to look at the past and the future concurrently. Remembering is crucial to have a temporal association so that present changes and developments can be elaborated in understanding the construction of memory (Six-Hohenbalken, 2018). Historical trauma is a psychological and emotional collective and subjective injury which are transmitted from adults to children in a cycle process, and it continues over a life span of individuals and across generations (Atkinson et al., 2010). States have their version of narrations of history and remembrance, which shape society’s collective memory through hard memories such as monuments, state laws, court decisions and memorial sites (Gang, 2020). This state version of history is taught both in the formal education system and through state narratives and symbols surrounding society members during their daily lives. Soft memories are created and shared as a social process. These are narratives, historical texts and similar, less tangible forms of memory. History education has a profound influence on social discourse and the way soft memories are perceived (Korostelina 2008), and since formal schooling is at the centre of shaping a generation and textbooks are the main medium of knowledge transmission, it is shaped by the official narrative and often presented selectively (Boon & Gopinathan, 2005). This research explores how the official regulation of history education is used to align official state discourse with social memory. The research employs secondary data and document analysis by examining course textbooks and exploring history education’s impact on individual narratives of remembrance and collective memory. It examines the long-term effects of what has been taught in secondary school history education on adulthood perceptions of past historical occurrences. Findings confirm that a consistent, official historical discourse supported by exposure to hard and soft memories enables the maintenance of collective memory as represented in the official discourse among society members.