The battle on the river Somme and the historical politics in Britain

Abstract

The article focuses on the commemorative experience of Britain in the context of a systematic study of the policy of memory at the present stage of the country's development. The main purpose of the study is to analyse the forms and ways of representing the Battle of the Somme in modern Britain as a historical reality, highlighting the main features of the British experience of preserving the memory of this event and transmitting it for a mass audience. The author proposes an attempt to trace the development of ideas in scientific and popular science materials concerning the event as a collective trauma, the memory of which has been reflected in British historiography since its formation in 1916. The collective memory of the events of the First World War in Britain is often ambiguous and debatable, especially the Battle of the Somme, which changed people's perception of armed conflicts. As part of the study of the British politics of memory, it was revealed that the "historical narrative" of the battle is to glorify the exploits of the expeditionary forces on the Western Front and at the same time criticise the commanders of the armed forces responsible for massive combat losses.