The politics of memory and forgetting in pedagogical practices: Towards pedagogies of reconciliation and peace in divided Cyprus

Abstract

Being raised in a divided country, we are deeply concerned with the ideological and affective practices that are used to perpetuate the existing stereotypes about the Other within each community. Using as a point of departure our own personal narratives - one of us is a Greek Cypriot (G/C) and the other Turkish Cypriot (T/C) - depicting the circulation of nationalistic technologies in education, this paper examines the prospects of peace and reconciliation education in Cyprus. The premise on which this paper rests - that nationalistic education is a problem - is not new; that premise is not the most important contribution of this paper. The more important contribution is the analysis and sorting through the G/C and T/C nationalistic pedagogical practices, to figure out ways to disrupt those practices and invoke pedagogies of reconciliation and peace in both communities. We also emphasise the importance of considering personal narratives of past trauma in critical terms to help us re-learn the wisdom of forgetting in order to remember that the weight of the past should not stand in the way of the future.