World War II in Ukrainian school history textbooks: mapping the discourse of the past

The main objective of this paper is to illustrate the conceptualisation of a textbook as a site of memory, a discourse and a genre. This paper investigates the semantic and linguistic elements of the discourse of World War II in Ukrainian school history textbooks for the 11th grade, centring on the...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Compare 2014-09, Vol.44 (5), p.756-777
Main Author: Klymenko, Lina
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Authoritarianism
Content Analysis
Discourse Analysis
Foreign Countries
Foreign Policy
Grade 11
High School Students
History education
History Instruction
Linguistics
Memory
Military studies
Nationalism
Semantics
Social Systems
Textbooks
Ukraine
Ukrainian
Victims
War
World War II
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Summary:The main objective of this paper is to illustrate the conceptualisation of a textbook as a site of memory, a discourse and a genre. This paper investigates the semantic and linguistic elements of the discourse of World War II in Ukrainian school history textbooks for the 11th grade, centring on the following distinct key themes: the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the German attack on the Soviet Union and the ensuing Nazi occupation regime, the Soviet army offensive followed by the restoration of the Soviet regime, and resistance movements. The textbooks analysed dismantle the Soviet myth of the Great Patriotic War and reveal the atrocities of Stalinism. They also create a new hero-and-victim paradigm: the heroic deeds of Ukrainians in the Soviet army and of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) fighting for Ukraine's independence are emphasised, as is the suffering of Ukrainians under the German occupation and the Stalinist regime.
ISSN:0305-7925
1469-3623
DOI:10.1080/03057925.2013.812431