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Download Thesis This electronic thesis or dissertation has been downloaded from the King’s Research Portal at https://kclpure.kcl.ac.uk/portal/ A critical exploration of the ways in which national identification is discursively constructed in the Greek Cypriot system Kouma, Vasiliki Awarding institution: King's College London The copyright of this thesis rests with the author and no quotation from it or information derived from it may be published without proper acknowledgement. END USER LICENCE AGREEMENT Unless another licence is stated on the immediately following page this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ You are free to copy, distribute and transmit the work Under the following conditions: Attribution: You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). Non Commercial: You may not use this work for commercial purposes. No Derivative Works - You may not alter, transform, or build upon this work. Any of these conditions can be waived if you receive permission from the author. Your fair dealings and other rights are in no way affected by the above. Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact [email protected] providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. Download date: 03. Oct. 2021 A critical exploration of the ways in which national identification is discursively constructed in the Greek Cypriot education system Vasiliki Kouma A Thesis submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the PhD Degree at King’s College London February 2018 Acknowledgements I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has contributed to this work by means of encouragement, time and ideas. In particular, I want to thank Professor Christopher Winch, for giving me the opportunity to start this research project. I also acknowledge the contribution of Professor Meg Maguire and Dr Anwar Tlili for their substantial help and contribution in the successful completion of my thesis. My warm thanks to all the interviewees, who gave up their precious time to participate in the research interviews. The example of my father’s life was a real inspiration for me to study issues related to the current political situation in Cyprus and it is to his memory that I dedicate this thesis. i Abstract This thesis explores the ways in which national identification is discursively constructed in the Greek Cypriot education system. The study focuses on a set of key educational documents and a set of interviews with some significant education policy actors in Cyprus. The intention is to critically explore those discourses which constitute attempts to imagine and construct Cypriot national identity. The study is based on an assumption that while official educational policies influence the construction of national identity, these educational practices can conflict with alternative and individually-constructed discursive models of national identity. This thesis investigates the tensions between official and individual modes of identification and interprets the tensions involved in attempts to maintain and to transform Cyprus’ national identity through the Greek Cypriot educational system. This research project adopts a qualitative design in order to explore the broadest possible range of identity constructs and their dialectical interrelations, as well as to identify in detail the recontextualisation of important concepts and arguments related to the ways in which national identification is discursively constructed in the Greek Cypriot education system. The empirical work that lies at the centre of this thesis investigates three different discursive contexts ranging from the official to the private. Specifically these are two key sets of documents: the New Curriculum, and the commemorative messages of the Minister of Education. The study also draws on the private discourse of a small number of policy actors involved in the Greek Cypriot education system, based on nine topic-oriented qualitative interviews. The findings trace the relations between models of discursive constructs of nations and national identities illustrated in the documentary and interview analysis. The findings also indicate that different identities are discursively constructed according to the anticipated audiences, topic and ii substantive content. In this sense, national identities are flexible and frequently ambivalent and diffuse. iii Table of Contents CHAPTER 1 .................................................................................................................... 1 THESIS INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................. 1 1.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................ 1 1.2 Description of the Circular announcing the aim for reconciliation ................... 3 1.3 Reason and assumptions for this study ................................................................ 6 1.4 Thesis synopsis ....................................................................................................... 8 CHAPTER 2 .................................................................................................................... 9 KEY THEORIES OF NATION, NATIONALISM AND NATIONAL IDENTITY ................ 9 2.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................ 9 2.2 Organic and voluntarist types of nationalism .................................................... 10 2.3 Competing conceptualizations of the nation and national identity .............. 15 2.3.1 Primordialist interpretation of nationalism ................................................. 17 2.3.1.1 The sociobiological approach .................................................................. 17 2.3.1.2 Cultural primordialism ............................................................................. 18 2.3.2 Perennialist interpretation of nationalism ................................................... 20 2.3.3 Modernist interpretations of nationalism .................................................... 21 2.3.3.1 Socioeconomic approach ......................................................................... 22 2.3.3.2 Sociocultural approach ............................................................................. 23 2.3.3.3 Political approach ..................................................................................... 25 2.3.3.4 Ideological approach ................................................................................ 26 2.3.3.5 Constructionist approach ......................................................................... 27 2.3.4 Ethno-symbolism interpretation of nationalism .......................................... 29 2.4 New approaches to nationalism .......................................................................... 30 2.4.1 Banal nationalism ........................................................................................ 32 2.4.2 Post-colonial theory .................................................................................... 33 2.4.3 Nationalism as discursive formation ........................................................... 34 2.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................. 37 CHAPTER 3 .................................................................................................................. 40 NATIONALIST MOVEMENTS IN CYPRUS ................................................................. 40 3.1 Introduction .......................................................................................................... 40 3.2 The development of nationalism in Cyprus ....................................................... 40 3.3 Concepts and discourses in Greek Cypriot politics ........................................... 52 3.4 The national question in Cyprus ......................................................................... 53 3.5 Conclusions ........................................................................................................... 60 CHAPTER 4 .................................................................................................................. 62 CONFLICTING PERSPECTIVES ABOUT NATIONAL LANGUAGES........................... 62 iv 4.1 Introduction .......................................................................................................... 62 4.2 Cultural identity and language policy ................................................................. 62 4.3 Standard language and dialects .......................................................................... 65 4.4 Language ideologies and language policies ....................................................... 68 4.5 The language question in Greece ........................................................................ 72 4.6 The case of Cyprus ............................................................................................... 74 4.7 Sociolinguistic situation in Cyprus ..................................................................... 79 4.8 The prospect of a solution to the Cyprus Problem ............................................ 84 4.9 Towards the research
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