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ABSTRACT
The present paper aims to examine teachers’ conceptualizations of Holocaust Education within the context of a conflict-affected society: ethnically-divided Cyprus. This exploration is conducted through a qualitative study of secondary school teachers’ understandings of the Holocaust and Holocaust Education in Greek-Cypriot schools, focusing on how educators situate their conceptualizations within the social, historical and political context of Cyprus. The paper examines the extent to which Holocaust Education is appropriated by the political situation in conflict-affected Cyprus and discusses the pedagogical implications of this appropriation. The analysis of the findings leads us to argue that it is unhelpful to reduce our conception of the connections between the teaching of the local history and the Holocaust as a matter of either/or, because the evidence from teachers’ pedagogical perspectives shows that there is often an interchange between foregrounding and backgrounding of these events. The paper concludes with a discussion of some recommendations for teacher education and future research, especially in conflict-affected countries that have been less affected by the Holocaust.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes on contributors
Michalinos Zembylas is Professor of Educational Theory and Curriculum Studies at the Open University of Cyprus. He is also Honorary Professor at Nelson Mandela University in the Chair for Critical Studies in Higher Education Transformation. He has written extensively on emotion and affect in relation to social justice pedagogies, intercultural and peace education, human rights education and citizenship education.
Loizos Loukaidis is a Teacher and Peace Education Consultant currently working at the Association for Historical Dialogue and Research in Nicosia, Cyprus. He has conducted workshops on issues related to Education for a Culture of Peace in Europe, the Americas and Asia and has developed several educational programs on peace and reconciliation in Cyprus. He has co-authored the Policy Paper Rethinking Education in Cyprus and the Manual How to Introduce Gender in History Teaching.
Petroula Antoniou has a PhD in Educational Studies from the Open University of Cyprus. She holds a Masters degree in Curriculum and Teaching and a BA in Primary Education. Her dissertation focused on refugee consciousness and education. In 2010, she worked at the European Commission in the Cabinet of the European Commissioner for Education, Culture, Multilingualism and Youth. She works as a primary school teacher and she also holds a position at the Pedagogical Institute of Cyprus. Her research interests lie in the area of educational philosophy and curriculum theory, especially on issues of intercultural and peace education.
Notes
1 Carrier, Fuchs and Messinger, The International Status About the Holocaust.
2 Ibid., 12–3.
3 van Driel, “Teaching about the Holocaust,” 14.
4 Avraham, “The problem with using historical parallels.”
5 Ibid., S33.
6 Stevick and Michaels, “Editorial introduction.”
7 von Borries, “Learning and teaching about the Shoah,” 431.
8 Carrier, Fuchs and Messinger, The International Status About the Holocaust.
9 Davis and Rubinstein-Avila, “Holocaust education”; Eckmann, Stevick and Ambrosewicz-Jacobs, Research in Teaching and Learning about the Holocaust; von Borries, “Learning and teaching about the Shoah”; Pearce and Chapman, “Holocaust education 25 years on.”
10 Pettigrew, “Why teach or learn about the Holocaust.”
11 Zembylas, “Holocaust laughter.”
12 Deutsch, Perkis and Granot-Bein, “Six teaching orientations of Holocaust educators”; Foster, “Teaching about the Holocaust in English schools.”
13 Conflict-affected societies are defined as those societies that are involved in what has come to be identified as protracted and intractable conflicts which are characterized by a prolonged struggle between ethnic/national groups around material and symbolic resources; see Bar-Tal, “From intractable conflict,” and “Nature, rationale, and effectiveness.”
14 Levinson and Sutton, “Introduction”; Stevick and Michaels, “Editorial introduction.”
15 Deutsch, Perkis and Granot-Bein, “Six teaching orientations of Holocaust educators.”
16 Carrier, Fuchs and Messinger, The International Status About the Holocaust; Stevick and Michaels, “Editorial introduction”; Pearce and Chapman, “Holocaust education 25 years on.”
17 Stevick and Michaels, “Editorial introduction.”
18 Kinloch, “Learning about the Holocaust”; Pettigrew, “Why teach or learn about the Holocaust.”
19 Kinloch, “Learning about the Holocaust.”
20 Pettigrew, “Why teach or learn about the Holocaust,” 266.
21 Ibid., 272.
22 Moisan, Hirsch and Audet, “Holocaust education in Quebec.”
23 van Driel, “Teaching about the Holocaust.”
24 Misco, “Holocaust curriculum development,” 400.
25 Ibid.
26 Cowan and Maitles, Understanding and Teaching Holocaust Education; Foster, “Teaching about the Holocaust in English schools”; Pettigrew et al., “Teaching about the Holocaust in English secondary schools”; van Driel, “Teaching about the Holocaust.”
27 Foster, “Teaching about the Holocaust in English schools.”
28 Deutsch, Perkis and Granot-Bein, “Six teaching orientations of Holocaust educators.”
29 Huerta, “Humanizing pedagogy,” 40.
30 Pratt, Five Perspectives on Teaching in Adult and Higher Education.
31 Levinson and Sutton, “Introduction”; Stevick and Michaels, “Editorial introduction.”
32 Levinson and Sutton, “Introduction,” 17.
33 Stevick and Michaels, “Editorial introduction.”
34 Ibid., 8.
35 Cohen, “Teacher autonomy within a flexible national curriculum.”
36 Hitchens, Cyprus; Mallinson, Cyprus.
37 Papadakis, “Narrative, memory and history education”; Sant Cassia, Bodies of Evidence.
38 Zembylas, Charalambous and Charalambous, Peace Education in a Conflict-Troubled Society.
39 Christou, “The language of patriotism.”
40 As shown later in the analysis, the issue of Greek-Cypriot refugees and the long-term animosity in Greek-Turkish relations—which goes back before 1974, over the last several centuries--are relevant aspects of interpreting the Holocaust and reflecting on its relevance today in the Greek-Cypriot educational system.
41 Roudometof and Christou, “1974 and Greek Cypriot identity.”
42 Bryant, “Partitions of memory,” 340.
43 Carrier, The Holocaust and Genocide in Contemporary Education in Europe.
44 Carrier, Fuchs and Messinger, The International Status About the Holocaust.
45 Cowan, “Reconceptualizing the Holocaust,” 169.
46 Ministry of Education and Culture, Curricula.
47 Ibid.
48 Ministry of National Education and Religions. Modern and Contemporary History 3rd Grade Gymnasium, 126–9.
49 Ministry of Education and Culture, Curricula.
50 Ibid.
51 Ministry of National Education and Religions, History of Modern and Contemporary World 3rd Grade General Lyceum, 129–33.
52 Ibid.
53 Kvale, Doing Interviews.
54 Lincoln and Guba, Naturalistic Inquiry.
55 Ibid.
56 Strauss and Corbin, Basics of Qualitative Research.
57 See also, Foster, “Teaching about the Holocaust in English schools.”
58 Moisan, Hirsch and Audet, “Holocaust education in Quebec.”
59 Pettigrew, “Why teach of learn about the Holocaust.”
60 See also, Foster, “Teaching about the Holocaust in English schools.”
61 See Eckmann, Stevick and Ambrosewicz-Jacobs. Research in Teaching and Learning About the Holocaust.
62 Foster, “Teaching about the Holocaust in English schools”; see IHRA guidelines on "What to teach, https://www.holocaustremembrance.com/index.php/educational-materials
63 Zembylas, “Political emotions in the classroom.”
64 Stevick and Michaels, “Editorial introduction.”
65 Deutsch, Perkis and Granot-Bein, “Six teaching orientations of Holocaust educators.”
66 Ibid., 95.
67 Zembylas, “Toward a critical-sentimental orientation in human rights education.”