CONSTRUCTING HISTORICAL CONSCIOUSNESS IN GREECE:

CULTURAL SYNCRETISM IN THE CONTEXT OF EUROPEAN UNIFICATION

DISSERTATION

Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for

the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate

School of The Ohio State University

By

Robin M. Giampapa

*****

The Ohio State University

2005

Dissertation Committee: Approved by

Professor Robert Lawson, Adviser _______________________

Professor Peter Demerath Adviser

College of Education
Professor Gregory Jusdanis
 Copyright by

Robin M. Giampapa

2005
 ABSTRACT

The purpose of this dissertation study is to explore high school students’

negotiation of historical knowledge in the modern Greek educational system. Both a

theoretical and empirical inquiry into Greek students’ attitudes about history, the project

is situated within the political context of a currently expanding European Union.

Utilizing an ethnographic case study approach, data is collected in a mixed methods

manner through history classroom observations, in-depth interviews, a detailed student

questionnaire and photographic representations with lyceum students, teachers and

administrators at Anatolia College, a private, college-preparatory school located in

northern Greece. The data is analyzed using the constant comparative method and the

results are considered in relation to the Greek national and International Baccalaureate

teaching programs. This comparison is used to describe the ways students negotiate

official and critical knowledge and how these forms of negotiation influence young

Greeks’ historical consciousness.

Generally, the study explores the relationship between education and identity. It

is suggested that the latter be understood as engagements in various discourses, the

former as a major participant in the process. Specifically, the study has been concerned

with two distinct history education programs offered at the school, one constructed

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around a national curriculum and the other around a non-national curriculum, and how

each participates in and influence students’ development of historical consciousness. In

doing so, the goal has been to provide a conceptualization of cultural identity among

these young Greeks in the context of Greek, European and European Union processes.

The outcomes of the research reveal five discourses utilized by students in

constructing historical consciousness. These discourses: common cultural heritage,

burden of the past, autochthonous Hellenism, the mobiles and occidentalism, combine in

complex, syncretic ways to form a collective identity among Anatolia youth that is

comfortable with coexisting tensions and mixture. This analysis suggests that its not so

much the curricular content that shapes cultural identity, rather, it is the ways in which

students choose to negotiate the types of knowledge presented to them that they choose to

engage in specific discourses. This implies that identities are not passive constructions of

the educational process, but rather they are active choices and actively changing to suit

certain conditions. Additionally, it suggests that Greek students’ cultural identity is one

by which national identities are cast not as alternatives to a European identity, but as

compatible with it.

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To my family and friends

iv
 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

First, I would like to express my sincere appreciation to my advisor, Professor

Robert Lawson, for his unvarying support and scholarly guidance throughout my doctoral

process. His initial encouragement and subsequent enthusiasm and advocacy made my

idea of this dissertation a reality. I am equally grateful to Professor Peter Demerath for

inspiring me by example of his own scholarly work and contagious passion for research

in the field. His conscientious direction was an invaluable component in this process. In

the same respect, I owe much gratitude to Professor Gregory Jusdanis for introducing me

to the field of Modern Greek studies and welcoming my desire to approach the field from

an educational perspective. His own publications have also shaped my intellectual

development and his well-rounded support is wholly appreciated. I would also like to

thank Professors Antoinette Errante and Patti Lather for their encouragement,

collaboration and influence on my work.

A special thanks to Anatolia College and all those students, faculty and

administrators who graciously participated in my study. They allowed me to observe

them and intrude on their lives, yet made me feel like a welcome member of their

community from the moment I arrived in Greece by embracing my study with particular

interest. Without their cooperation, this dissertation would not have been possible.

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 Finally, I am grateful to my family and close friends for their understanding and

support. Particularly, to my mother and brother, who stand by me no matter what the

situation and provide me with unconditional love. To Denny, Charlie and Alex, whom I

am extraordinarily fortunate to have in my life and who continually provide models of

kindheartedness and generosity that I hope to emulate. And to Panayiotis, whose love I

cannot compare and whose presence makes the journey significant.

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 VITA

January 30, 1968 Born—Columbus, Ohio

1991 B.S.
The Ohio State University

1998 M.A.
The Ohio State University.

1999-2002 Graduate Teaching and Research Associate,

The Ohio State University.

FIELDS OF STUDY

Major Field: Education

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT …………………………………………………………………… ii

DEDICATION ………………………………………………………………… iv

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS …………………………………………………… v

VITA …………………………………………………………………………… vii

TABLE OF CONTENTS ………………………………………………………. viii

LIST OF FIGURES ……………………………………………………………. xii

CHAPTERS PAGE

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ……………………………………………… 1

Statement of the Problem …………………………………………………. 1

Purpose of the Study ……………………………………………………… 4
Theoretical Assumptions …………………………………………….……. 9
Significance of the Study …………………………………………………. 14
Overview of the Chapters ………………………………………………. 16

CHAPTER 2: REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE……………………………. 21

NATIONALISM AND MODERN GREECE ……………………..……... 23

An Historical Narrative of Modern Greece …………………….… 24
Types and Processes of Nationalism …………………….……….. 26
Nationalism as a Cultural Phenomenon in Greece ……………….. 30
Creating a National Myth …………………………………….…… 32
Crisis of the Nation-State ……………………………….………… 34

CONSTRUCTING A NEW EUROPEAN SPACE ……………….……… 36

The European Union as an Imagined Community ………………... 37

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 Rendering “the West” …………………………………….………. 41
The New Identity Project ……………………………….………… 43

HISTORY AND HISTORY EDUCATION ……………….…………….. 48

The Postmodern Historical Debate ……………………………….. 48
School History versus Other Kinds of History …………………… 52

CHAPTER 3: EDUCATION IN EUROPE: REFLECTIONS ON THE

LAST THREE DECADES ……………..………………………..………………. 56

DEVELOPING A EUROPEAN DIMENSION IN EDUCATION….……. 57

The Council of Europe ……………………………………………. 59
The European Union ……………………………………………… 60
Outcomes of a Europeanization of Education …………………….. 62

PROBLEMATIZING ASSUMPTIONS ……………... ……………….…. 65

The Rhetoric of Inclusiveness …………………………………….. 65
Assuming Positive Outcomes ……………………………………... 66

THREE DECADES OF EDUCATION REFORM IN GREECE ………… 68

The Decade of the 1980s: PASOK and Third Way
Socialist Reform…………………………………………… 70
The Decade of the 1990s: Return of PASOK and
EREFORM 2000 ………………………………………….. 72
New Century: New Democracy for Education ………………….... 75
Forces that Bind ……………………………..……………………. 76

CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY .……………..……………… 80

DEFINING THE PROJECT ……………………………………………… 80

Research Design ……………………...…………………………… 81
Explicit Purposes and Research Questions …………………..…… 82
Framing Epistemologies ………………………………..………… 85
Anatolia College: The Setting and Negotiating Entry ……………. 87

METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH ……………………………………..91

Justification for Doing an Ethnographic Case Study……………….92
Criticisms of the Methodology ……………………….…………… 94

DATA COLLECTION METHODS ……………………………………… 97

Participant Observation …………………………………………… 98
Individual and Group Interviews …………………….……………. 101
Student Questionnaire …………………………………………….. 102

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 Photographic Representations ……………………..……………… 104

ADVANTAGES AND CHALLENGES OF THE RESEARCH DESIGN. 105

Trustworthiness …………………………………………………… 105
Interpretation and Representation …………………….….……..… 107
Language Issues …………………………………………………… 108

CHAPTER 5: COMPARING STUDENT HISTORICAL

CONSCIOUSNESS THROUGH OFFICIAL AND CRITICAL
KNOWLEDGES ………………………………………………………………… 110

AN INTERNATIONAL ORIENTATION TO EDUCATION …………….110

Historical Roots in Asia Minor ……………………………………. 113
Influences from America ………………………………………….. 114
The International Baccalaureate Program ………………………… 117

CONTRASTING APPROACHES TO HISTORY EDUCATION ……..… 120

Three Central Concepts ……………..…………………………….. 122
Vignette I: Portrait of a Lesson …………………………………….124
Describing School History in the Greek Lyceum ………………… 126
Vignette II: A Room with a View ………………………………….131
The IB Way to School History ……………………………...…….. 133

HISTORICAL CONSCIOUSNESS: STUDENTS’ PERSPECTIVES ….....141

What Happens in History Classes? ……………………..………… 141
Which Historical Methods Would You Use? …………………..… 143

CHAPTER 6: IMAGINING CULTURAL IDENTITY AS A SYNCRETIC

PROCESS OF DISCOURSES AMONG GREEK YOUTH ……….……….… 147

FIVE DISCOURSE GENRES OF CULTURAL IDENTITY …….……… 149

Common Cultural Heritage …………………………………..…… 152
Burden of the Past ………………………………………..……….. 160
Autochthonous Hellenism ………………………………..……….. 167
The Mobiles ………………………………………….…………… 174
Occidentalism …..…………………………………………………. 179

A DISCUSSION ABOUT THE DISCOURSE GENRES .....…………….. 188

Conceptualizing Cultural Identity as Discourses ………………..…189
Collective European Identity ………………………………..…….. 193
Influences from School History ……………………….………….. 194

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CHAPTER 7: CONCLUSIONS ……………………….……………………….. 199

Revisiting the Research Questions ………………………………………... 200

Generalizability of the Findings …………………………………………... 202
Contributions to the Field of Comparative and International Education ….. 205
Aporias and Further Avenues of Research ………………………………... 206

APPENDICES …………………………………………………………….………. 209

APPENDIX A: Student Questionnaire …………………………………… 209
APPENDIX B: Questionnaire Results as Mean Scores ………..……….… 216
APPENDIX C: Letters to Participants ………………………………….… 233
APPENDIX D: Consent Forms ………………………………………….... 241

BIBLIOGRAPHY ………………………………………………………….……….244

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 LIST OF FIGURES

Figure Page

5.1 Anatolia History Classes Graph …………………………………………… 142

5.2 Historical Methods Graph …………………………………………………. 143

6.1 E.U. Enlargement Graph …………………………………………………… 154

6.2 Student photograph of the Kamara (Arch of Galarius) in

Thessaloniki, Greece ……………………………………………………….. 156

6.3 Student photograph of the Lefkos Pyrgos (White Tower) in

Thessaloniki, Greece ………………………………………………………. 157

6.4 E.U. Membership Graph …………………………………………………… 157

6.5 Meaning of “European” Graph …………………………………………….. 158

6.6 Meaning of “History” Graph ………………………………………………. 162

6.7 Student photograph of the Statue of Aristotle in Thessaloniki, Greece ….... 164

6.8 Student photograph of the Greek landscape ……………………………….. 169

6.9 E.U. Membership and Enlargement Graph ………………………………… 171

6.10 Geographical Areas Graph ………………………………………….……… 172

6.11 Student photograph depicting the pervasiveness of mobile phones

in daily life …………………………………………………………………. 175

6.12 Student photograph depicting an artistic rendering of three

members of the 17th November terrorist organization ……………………... 180

6.12 Comparative chart highlighting differences in students’ attitudes towards

Hellenic heritage pride and in Greece’s position in the Balkans ………….. 180

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Figure Page

6.12 Comparative chart illustrating a general summary of employment of

the five discourse genres among Greek lyceum and IB students at
Anatolia College …………………………………………………………. 187

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 CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

Statement of the Problem

In May 2004, ten nation-states from Central and Eastern Europe joined a then

Western dominated European Union, thus expanding the institution’s membership from

fifteen to twenty-five states. Together, these members share common institutions and

delegate a small portion of their sovereignty so that decisions on matters of perceived

joint interest may be made at a transnational European level. This expansion, the latest

step in the European unification process, is one of various reasons for the emergence of

two significant aspirations: (1) an awareness of a collective European culture and (2) a

common European dimension in the field of education. In various capacities, a shared

theme among these aspirations is history. In other words, if one understands participation

in the European Union as an attempt by European states to close the chapter of historical

antagonism and open that of cooperation and integration (Ioakimidis, 1999), it appears

that Europe’s unification process is a tangible political expression of such an initiative.

From an educational perspective, the European expansion process calls into

question the traditionally ethnocentric role of teaching history in European states. Here,

the relationship between culture and history emerges. Specifically, one’s understanding

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of history is considered to be a contributor to individual and collective senses of

belonging, common myths of origin and cultural and multi-perspectival enrichment. At

the same time, history has been charged with developing exclusive and assumed superior

identities, creating animosity between nations, ethnic, social, political and religious

groups and justifying policies leading to discrimination, persecution and conflict

(EUSTORY Charter, 2005). Gabriele Bucher-Dinc, current executive director of

EUSTORY, an organization in Europe with the mission of developing a common

approach to teaching and learning history among all members of the continent,

encapsulates the issue when he states that “[t]he ideological divisions which were present

in Europe in the 20th century are disappearing. This requires a new awareness of history

as part of our individual and collective identity” (ibid.).

In association, ten years earlier the European Commission supported an empirical

survey in 27 European countries called Youth and History: A Comparative European

Survey on Historical Consciousness and Political Attitudes among Adolescents (1994,

1995). As a whole, the survey explored history education from the perspective of 32,000

participating teenagers. Some questions explored how students have been socialized to

think of history by probing their understandings of the essence and methods of history,

their motivations for learning history, their trust in and fun with historical media, and

their perceptions of how they have been taught history. Other questions examined the

students’ chronological knowledge, the ways they interpret selected events in the past,

and how these interpretations affect their understanding of such concepts as the nation,

Europe, and democracy. Still others look at the ways historical learning has influenced

the political attitudes and decisions of students, including their use of history in

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argumentation, their ability to empathize with others, and their attitudes on current

political issues. The last set of questions investigated how students perceive the

relationship of past, present and future as well as what they deem to be the major

determinants of historical change (Angvik & von Borries, 1997, pp. A37-41).

These combined interests of the last decade, but certainly not limited to the

period, provide a productive opportunity for studying the relationship between European

youth’s understandings of national and European cultural identity and correspondingly,

the influence and responsibility of history education programs in this relationship. With

data gathered, a central issue facing Europe and European history education may be

examined. Namely, how are school history programs responding to the processes taking

place in Europe and likewise, is there evidence for them having any relevance to these

processes, particularly in shaping cultural identity among European youth? It is the

objective of this research project to investigate this relationship not from the viewpoint of

politicians, policy makers or textbooks, but from the oft-neglected perspective of today’s

European youth (Dragonas & Frangoudakis, 2000) in their history classes as they are

experiencing and learning about the processes of unification taking place around them.

Thus, observing how teachers teach and students learn history in today’s classrooms and

talking to students about their own perceptions are intended to illuminate these questions

from an empirical, student-centered perspective.

As the developers of the Youth and History survey have found, we know very

little about young people’s attitude and feelings about history in Europe (Angvik, 1997,

p. A19). Research concerning history education in Europe has been limited and most

researchers interested in this area have focused on textbook revision (Pingel et al., 2001),

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reform issues (Kazamias et al 2001) and curricular content (Stradling, 2001; Gundara,

1996; Mitter, 1996). Furthermore, aside from the Youth and History survey, empirical

research on students’ perspectives of contemporary history has been relatively rare

(Dragonas & Frangoudaki, 2000; 2001). Magne Angvik claims that “at least in some

countries of Europe one might in a rough estimate say that for every hundred researchers

engaged in obtaining new empirical knowledge about history only one or two are

engaged in educational research within history” (Angvik, 1997, p. A19). This means

that one of the least systematically studied aspects of history education in the European

context, principally in non-Western regions, is the experience of schooling itself

(Kazamias 2001; 2003). As a result, relatively few researchers have actually spent

extended periods of time observing the school setting. Consequently, little is known

about what goes on in history classrooms and students’ attitudes about historical

knowledge. Thus, it comes as no surprise that so little is known about the consequences

of historical knowledge on cultural processes among those who are exposed to it, in spite

of the assertion that this is bound to provide constructive understandings of teaching and

learning processes (ibid.).

Purpose of the Study

This research study is concerned with the transmission and negotiation of

historical knowledge in the Greek educational system. Both a theoretical and empirical

inquiry into school history and cultural identity, the project is situated within the political

context of a currently expanding European Union. The central goal is to compare

national and a non-national ways of teaching and learning history in the lyceum at

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Anatolia College, located in northern Greece, and assess the influence and responsibility

of history education programs in shaping young Greeks’ cultural identity. Broadly,

knowledge gained from the study, grounded in the voices of students and the experience

of the classroom, aims to add fresh empirical perspectives to the existing pool of

educational research based on textbook, reform and curriculum analyses in the European

context. It provides empirical descriptions of what is going on in European history

classrooms today, firsthand accounts of how students react to and negotiate historical

knowledge and grounded analyses of their relevance to the current context of neo-

European modernity (Kazamias). As such, conducting an ethnographic case study is a

well-matched methodological process for accessing the experience of schooling,

generally, and students’ perspectives on school history in particular. Additionally,

prolonged exposure and repeated observations and interviews have been paramount. To

be sure, educational ethnography necessitates prolonged exposure in the field and

continued contact with participants (Geertz, 1973).

Greece, a member of the European Union since 1981, may be described from

various perspectives in Europe. For example, it was the least financially stable and only

Eastern State in the European Union prior to the recent expansion, it is still the only

Balkan State in this European institution, it is described as a cultural and geographical

bridge to Asia and Africa in the southeastern part of Europe, it occupies an important

position in the waterways of the Mediterranean and it is often referred to in discussions of

the foundations of European civilization. I believe that it is a constructive context from

which to address the relationship between European culture and school history for several

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reasons. First, in Greece, as in other marginal States1, the teaching of history and other

subjects are believed to remain, to a large extent, an ideological mechanism for the

cultivation of an ethnocentric ethos (Avdela, 2000; van der Leeuw-Roord, 2001).

Second, the currently expanding European Union, especially the joining of ten non-

Western nation-states in 2004, provides an explicit opportunity to discuss a contemporary

historical event that is relevant to today’s Greek high school students. Third, while

Greece’s ancient past is firmly situated in the context of Western ideology, its

contemporary history, in school and in the wider field of historical studies, is often

overshadowed by this past and neglected as a subject of meaningful topic of inquiry

(Herzfeld, 1987; Kazamias, 2001). Finally, the site of the study, a well-known northern

Greek high school, offers a unique comparative context of two history education

programs, one following a highly centralized national curriculum and the other a non-

national curriculum emphasizing historical methods, from which students may choose

one or the other as a course of study.

The study was carried out primarily during the 2002-2003 academic year. A

second data collection phase took place in the latter half of the following academic year.

The research site, Anatolia College, is a private, college-preparatory high school located

in Thessaloniki, a major city in northern Greece. Although a private school that receives

no subsidies from governmental sources, the school must conform to government

regulations regarding curricula, textbooks, and examinations. In this respect, it is not

much different from state schools. The school also offers the International Baccalaureate

1
I use the term “marginal” as a position, not an essence, and use it to define States in the European Union
that are less economically stable, politically insecure, less technologically complex, or geographically
peripheral vis-à-vis dominant European states such as Great Britain, France and Germany.
6
Diploma program, a comprehensive two-year course of study based on a non-national

curriculum. While the College has an elite reputation in Greece, my data reveal that the

student population is quite diverse and represents a range of socio-economic levels,

ethno-cultural backgrounds, geographical regions, and religious affiliations. However,

the majority of the student population is from economically middle-class and upper

middle-class Greek Orthodox families. Therefore, the study is presented as an individual

case study and is not meant to be a representation of general population of Greek youth.

In the years the study was conducted, the school served approximately 1,245 students,

including the Greek gymnasium and lyceum and an International Baccalaureate division.

Participants included students, philologues (humanities teachers) and administrators in

the Greek lyceum and International Baccalaureate division. Data collection methods

included participant observations, in-depth interviews, photographic representations and a

student questionnaire.

Conducting a case study at Anatolia College offers the potential of exploring local

meaning production of issues related to school history in Europe, nationalism, and

cultural identity. Specifically, I explore how students negotiate knowledge in their

history classrooms and how they engage in particular discourses as a way of situating,

describing and making meaning of their own cultural identities. While case studies have

their limits, their contribution to micro-level understandings in different types of school

settings, especially those outside the northern and western industrialized zones of Europe,

and at various historical periods, has further potential for describing and generating local

understandings in the wider framework of transnational processes, such as those taking

place in Europe today. In turn, such research may be used to build upon existing

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collections of case studies and generate new understandings and relationships in different

types of historical and social configurations (Arnove, 1999, p. 14). While these

theoretical purposes outline my research at Anatolia College, the following set of

research questions serve as a contingent guide for it.

1. Anatolia College’s mission statement maintains that the school strives to be a

concrete expression of international values. What is the school’s educational
philosophy as articulated by the administration?

2. There are two distinct history programs, the Greek lyceum and the
International Baccalaureate, available to students at Anatolia College. How
do these two history programs compare with regard to knowledge production
and negotiation?

3. How can the particular discourses that Anatolia students employ in order to
culturally situate themselves be described? How do these discourses
contribute to a current narrative of Greekness and Europeanness?

4. In Europe, the issue of creating a collective identity among European youth is

situated within discourses of educational change. Is there a basis for a
European identity, or collective cultural identity, among Greek students at
Anatolia College?

5. How influential is school knowledge, particularly history education at

Anatolia College, in the processes of cultural identity?

6. What difficult questions may result from an ethnographic case study of

Anatolia College? How are these aporias2 productive, dangerous, and/or
seductive for studies of culture and education? In what directions do they lead
further research?

2
Aporia is a Greek word meaning “question, query, doubt, surprise, wonder, wonderment, puzzlement.”
In ancient Greek, it means “non-passage.” It is different from the Greek word erotisi (question, query,
interrogation), which is something that is possible to answer (e.g. What time is it?). An aporia, however, is
a question that cannot be answered according to the epistemological conventions in which it is posed (e.g.
Is there a god?). An aporia, then, specifies an impasse, a stuck place.
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Theoretical Assumptions

The theoretical assumptions of this study are fourfold: ethnographic data is a

trustworthy method for examining school processes; dimensions of globalization and

transnationalism are useful concepts for exploring processes taking place in Europe

today; history as knowledge is culturally filtered in schools; and conceptualizations of

cultural identity as a set of binary oppositions are undesirable in the current European

context.

First, educational ethnography is “an ongoing attempt to place specific

encounters, events, and understandings into a fuller, more meaningful context” (Tedlock,

2000, p. 445). As a researcher, I situate myself within the qualitative intepretivist

paradigm whereby ways of constructing knowledge are achieved as “the knower and the

known interact and shape one another” (Denzin, 2000, p. 21). This implies that research

is reciprocal and recursive and forms of knowledge are partial, positioned, and

perspectival (Lather, 2000). In addition, I utilize quantitative methods as a way of

presenting a greater diversity of divergent views. This integration of mixed methods “is

seen as being better able to reflect social realities” (Rocco et al., 2003, p.597). What this

means for my project is a commitment to using a case study approach for engaging with

local, contextualized and non-essentializing conceptual strategies in ways that work to

replace master narratives. It does not, however, mean that modernist ways of knowing

are rejected entirely. Rather, they are blended with new ways of knowing to form new

conceptualizations (St. Pierre, 2000; Middleton, 1996).

As Robert Arnove (1999) suggests in an article attempting to reframe comparative

education, “case studies are likely to continue to be the most commonly used approach to

9
studying education-society relations,” and the most valuable will be those that are

conducted in local schools in peripheral settings (pp. 14-15). He points to recent

examples of promising studies wherein the interplay of the global and the local are

brought out. One danger with the case study approach rests in attempts to generalize

from one case to other instances that may not be appropriate. Another is to view the

world from a myopic lens. Both of these snares are potentially dangerous in doing case

studies in Europe. Because Europe is consciously working to unify its space, the

seduction of making generalizations may be strong. At the same time, examining a local

setting without framing it in the context of European projects that are permeating regional

spheres neglects the force of globalization taking place in the world today.

In this ethnographic case study, I explore a local school setting that is situated in

the larger framework of European Union educational and cultural initiatives and

aspirations. A second theoretical assumption, then, is that my project may be described

in the context of both the globalization and transnationalization of culture and in

processes of a local setting. John Comaroff, in The Politics of Difference (1996),

describes these two themes as complementary sides of a single historical movement. As

he describes it: denotation may be global, but connotation is always local. Although

globalization was originally used to describe economic developments at the world level,

it has been quite useful in exploring other recent processes and developments. “Scholars

have studied world cultural and political integration, for instance, as dimensions of

globalization; it is in such contributions that we encounter references to the

“McDonaldization” or “Americanization” of culture and to the “withering” or “retreat” of

the nation-state” (Clayton, 2004, p. 274).

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 Correspondingly, in Issues in Educational Research: Problems and Possibilities

(1999), Kathleen Hall presents two major foci of studies in globalization as “first,

research into the production of global cultures, institutions, and cultural forms; and

second, the local articulation of global processes” (p. 143). Hence, research into theories

of local-global connections suggest potential for generating new ways of thinking about

local responses to educational projects that claim to be working within transnational or

global contexts as in the European Union (p. 145). As a concept, globalization may

broadly be defined as “the intensification of world-wide social relations which link

distant localities in such a way that local happenings are shaped by events occurring

many miles away and vice-versa” (Kearney, 1995, p. 548). Major themes in the

globalization theory that I identify can be summarized as (1) a questioning of the role of

the nation-states, (2) tensions and/or dialectics between local and global forces, (3) the re-

conceptualization of borders, and (4) changes in the center to periphery model.

Importantly, these themes overlap and work as integral, but not necessarily equal or

categorical, parts of a whole process.

A main distinction in discussing this theoretical perspective is that between

globalization and transnationalism. The distinguishing feature of these two processes is

that of space. According to Kearney “global processes are largely decentered from

specific national territories and take place in a global space” whereas “transnational

processes are anchored in and transcend one or more nation-states” (ibid.). Thus,

globalization calls attention to developments and movements of things such as

technology, communication, finance, environment, tourism, migration and commerce.

11
Transnationalism, on the other hand, makes reference to the cultural and political projects

of nation-states as they compete and cooperate with other nation-states (ibid.).

The study’s focus on the relationship between the processes of history education

in a local Greek setting and students’ cultural identity vis-à-vis the European unification

project suggests that it be situated in and informed first by processes of transnationalism

and secondarily in discourses of globalization. Correspondingly, data from this project

suggest that the Greek nation-state, especially as a cultural phenomenon, is not

necessarily weakening in the context of a consolidated Europe, but perhaps shifting in

relation to its role in creating a historical and national narrative for students at Anatolia

College.

The third theoretical assumption of this study is that history is not an objective

record of past events nor is it identical with the past. Rather, “history as knowledge is

culturally filtered. It is a selective reconstruction of the past and an interpretation of what

has happened” (EUSTORY Charter, 2005). As such, history education holds agency as a

potentially productive process in the European context. History and history education in

Europe traditionally have been mechanisms for cultivating divisive, exclusionary

attitudes towards others (Bergedorf Round Table et al., 2003). However, as European

unification processes advocate greater cooperation and comradeship among its members,

the ways in which histories of Europe and beyond the continent are presented become

increasingly important.

This does not mean to present national histories as necessarily ethnocentric nor

does it imply a negation or total abandonment of national histories in the context of the

European space. On the contrary, it is the richness of national histories that have the

12
potential of contributing to a Europe of inclusion and cooperation. This “richness,”

however, points to a paradox for history education in the European context. Namely,

how will the teaching of European history escape its own history? In other words, is

history education in Europe able to set aside past antagonisms in order to foster

collaborative and germane understandings of historical events? From this perspective, I

believe that history education has important implications for understanding the more

abiding problem regarding young people’s attitudes toward social inclusion and exclusion

in the European context and likewise, for illuminating ideas about the responsibility of

history education in addressing these problems. This includes issues such as

ethnocentrism, intolerance and marginalization that have long plagued the European

social and cultural landscape.

Finally, the concept of identity is a necessary fiction of this research project.

Thus, I set forth the final theoretical assumption. Specifically, this project endeavors to

imagine cultural identity as a rich syncretic model of mixture and coexisting tensions; a

model which deviates from identity as essentializing and exclusive, and having the

objective of rendering easy classifications of cultural identity less acceptable (Tziovas,

2001, p. 189). In such a view, identity is conceptualized as having multiple, conflicting

and seemingly incompatible sites present within the same domain. The relation of culture

and identity is determined less by physical position than by the discourses, institutions,

and procedures present in a place (Leontis, 1995). Thus, identity is presented in this

project as capable of housing a heterogeneous mix of discourses. By conceptualizing

cultural identity in this way, it is possible to understand how seemingly incompatible

ideas may exist in the same space, thus addressing the problematic assumptions of

13
identity without trying to reduce the problem to simple dichotomies. In understanding

the multiple sources of these identities, there is a potential for changing the negative ways

in which people think, talk and write about it, i.e., as essentializing, exclusionary or

inferiorizing. Thus, the focus becomes the expression of discourses of identity rather

than the people that are affected by it.

Significance of the Study

The significance of this dissertation project and its contributions to the general

field of education and the specific area of European education are manifold. First, the

relationship between political unification and educational processes addressed in this

project is a timely theme for educational research. This study challenges the orthodoxy

of certain traditional educational processes, such as national narratives reproduced in

history courses, but simultaneously searches for productive outcomes of these processes.

We live in a changing world that requires a new awareness of increasing diversity within

the classroom environment. Specifically, European history education programs must

recognize the positive power of diversity as a rich variety of countries, some large, some

very small, strive in their distinctive ways to achieve a balance between their history and

the demands of the changing political structure as they accept and are influenced by

increasing interaction with the rest of Europe. This demands that educational researchers

be deliberate in examining what actually transpires in schools, primarily students’

attitudes and the multiple layers of classroom interactions, and utilize the potentially

valuable data therein. In other words, educational research must address the confluence

and disparity between what is idealistically promoted and what is actually practiced.

14
 Second, knowledge gained from the study, grounded in the voices of Greek

students and classroom interaction, contributes fresh perspectives to the existing pool of

educational research based on textbook and curriculum analyses in the European context.

With the deficiency in research about the experience of schooling itself, a crucial

component of education, namely, what actually goes on in the classroom, is relatively

unknown. Particularly in the European Union, these student-grounded perspectives must

begin to contribute to the development of new goals for teaching history in Europe, goals

that reject history education as a place for the cultivation of ethnocentric ideas and accept

the responsibility of history education as a subject through which differences are

recognized and respected, rights are acknowledged, collaboration is learned and

practiced, and new perspectives are taught (Avdela, 2000; Koulouri, 2002).

Third, the project critically questions taken-for-granted processes occurring in

Europe today. In particular, it explores history education and cultural identity in Greece

as processes that may be understood not as reifying mechanisms of nationalism, but as

complex, often contradictory processes wherein coexisting tensions comfortably exist. In

this way, cultural identity is seen as capable of housing multiple and diverse ideas and

discourses, thus setting the stage for inclusion perspectives that welcome diversity rather

than assimilation perspectives wherein xenophobia provokes and justifies policies

leading to conflict. As the only Balkan state currently in the European Union, history

education and perspectives on cultural identity carry potential for promoting interregional

cooperation as a means of fostering stability and prosperity in the wider area of southeast

Europe and of promoting the gradual integration of Balkan states, as desired, into a new

European architecture, primarily the European Union (Ioakimidis, 1999).

15
 Fourth, the project endeavors to encourage academically rigorous methods among

educational researchers in Europe by applying methods that rely on clear questions, a

critical use of empirical evidence, the fundamentality of interpretive multi-perspectivity,

and the support of productive and critically engaged outcomes significant to present

educational situations.

Finally, a significant end result of any ethnographic fieldwork is to consider the

potential benefits of the research to its participants. With knowledge about how the

students perceive their history education and construct discourses of cultural identity, I

may reveal to Anatolia College how the Greek national history curriculum and

International Baccalaureate program are responding to processes taking place in Europe

and the European Union. Throughout my research, however, the goal is to maintain

credibility as a researcher, not as a consultant imposing value judgments on the school.

Overview of the Chapters

Chapter 2 presents a review of the literature relevant to this study. The first part

of the chapter provides an overview of nationalism and modern Greece. This begins with

an historical narrative of Greece before 1821. The purpose here is to ground my

discussion in a historical and cultural setting, albeit a selected one, and to trace Greece’s

path through the nationalist project. Next, I describe different types and processes of

nationalism based on the work of John Camaroff and Clifford Geertz respectively, as

frameworks for emphasizing the cultural capacity for nationalism. After setting this

foundation, I move to a discussion of nationalism as a cultural phenomenon in Greece

and introduce the current debate regarding the question of nationalism as a meaningful

16
object of cultural analysis, i.e., the crisis of the nation-state. The next section of the

literature review examines some of the processes of Europe, European integration and the

Europeanization of education currently in operation. I begin with the perspective of the

European Union as an imagined community and the discourses that construct this

transnational space. Next, I present an overview of how depictions of the West work to

assume an epistemological notion of binary Otherness and place it in the context of

understanding standard presentations of Greek identity. In the discussion of identity,

particular attention is paid to the ways in which educational systems have cultivated a

sense of national identity in Greece and elsewhere in Europe and the complex

relationship between Greekness and Europeaness. In the final section of the chapter, the

discussion moves to topics related to history and history education. Here, I present

theoretical debates within the discipline of history, particularly related to postmodern

historical studies, and give examples from Greece of different types of school history.

Chapter 3 presents an in-depth discussion of the development of a European

dimension in education and specific reasons to legitimate support for and resistance to the

Europeanization process as it relates to education. This includes attention to the most

important pan-European organizations, the European Union and the Council of Europe,

as they relate to educational issues. It outlines productive and dangerous challenges to

the Europeanization of education and warns that the rhetoric of inclusiveness is not

always clear in defining Europe and likewise, gives the warning that positive outcomes of

the benevolent project of inclusiveness appear to be assumed rather than established. The

second half of the chapter provides an historical outline of three decades of education

reform in Greece. Beginning with the 1980s and the socialist PASOK government, it

17
then moves through the 1990s and the introduction of a new reform proposal but the

same persistence of chronic system pathologies. Finally, the reform history ends with a

discussion of education in the new millennium with a new government, New Democracy.

Despite the changes in governments and educational ideas through the last thirty years,

educational reform in Greece may be described as a “sisyphian struggles,” i.e., struggles

that have continually plagued the Greek educational system since the early formation of

the nation-state. Particularly, the two most significant forces, history and culture, are

discussed as the forces that have limited the possibility for system change.

Chapter 4 provides a description of the study’s methodology. As outlined in the

chapter, the study utilizes the tools of educational ethnography and a mixed methods

research design to explore the relationship between school history and cultural identity in

Greece. In some depth, I identify the research design, including the detailed parameters

of the study, explicit purposes, and data collection methods. Advantages and challenges

to the research design, including trustworthiness, interpretation, representation and

language issues complete the methodological discussion.

Chapter 5 provides a descriptive and interpretive analysis of Anatolia College and

identifies and examines themes that define the school’s educational philosophy as

articulated by three central administrators. Then, it analyzes, through vignettes and

comparison, the two history programs offered by the school. In the Greek lyceum, it is

suggested that official forms of knowledge production are dominant and explicitly

practiced whereas the International Baccalaureate provides students with more

opportunities for critical knowledge production, leaving official knowledge on the margin

of pedagogical practices here. These two forms of knowledge, official and critical, are

18
further explored as important factors in the development of historical consciousness

among students in both programs. As such, historical consciousness, understood in this

study as interpretations of the past, understandings of the present and expectations for the

future, and the relationship among these three components, helps identify and describe

discourses used by students in classroom discussions related to Europe, European

integration and Greece vis-à-vis them.

In Chapter 6, I identify, describe and support from data five discourses used

frequently and employed in diverse ways by Anatolia students in various situations. Each

discourse is identified in relation to student historical consciousness as follows. The

common cultural heritage discourse is described as a one of shared inheritance and

tradition and is defined by static interpretations of the past. It is constructed around

students’ perceptions and attitudes about Greece vis-à-vis Europe and the European

Union. The burden of the past discourse is constructed around the tenuous relationship

between a haughty past and an insufficient present condition. It is defined by

interpretations of Greek and European pasts that are fixed and an understanding of the

present condition of Greece as belated with respect to its past. The third discourse,

autochthonous Hellenism, involves an effort to develop a native identity rooted in a

unique form of authentic Greekness while at the same time defining itself vis-à-vis

Western Europe. As with the first discourse, this one originates with discussions of

Greece vis-à-vis Europe and the European Union and is defined by a particularly

indigenous understanding of Greece’s present condition. The discourse of the mobiles

denotes a shift in the way young Greeks in both divisions at Anatolia understand the

European space. Unlike the others, this discourse is situated within a non-territorial,

19
spatial understanding of the European place. In discussions of European integration, it is

defined by a historical consciousness which understands the technological advancements

of the present as positive and as leading to the expectation for a more transnational future.

Finally, the discourse of occidentalism is employed by students who are politically

engaged and want to learn about and form opinions from historical issues that are not a

part of the national myth-making narrative. Their orientation to the past, present and

future of Greece is critical and multi-perspectival and they apply this discourse to

discussions of defining Europe, European integration and Greece vis-à-vis Europe and

the European Union. The chapter ends with a discussion of the discourses. Specifically,

I present a syncretic model for understanding cultural identity that highlights the

complexities and richness of Greek culture; a new approach to Greek cultural identity

based on the notions of contradiction and dialogue (Tziovas, 2001).

In the concluding chapter, I review the main analytic and interpretive points of the

study and suggest constructive questions that are difficult to answer as implications of the

study. I start by reviewing the research questions in a succinct, abridging manner. Then

I argue that there are some generalizations about education and identity that can be made

from the research findings. I propose that this educational study can challenge general

assumptions of the European unification project, of which Greece is a part, in an effort to

move productively beyond them by thinking differently about them. These two

assumptions are outlined therein. The chapter comes to a close by addressing

contributions of the study to the field of comparative and international education. These

final sections emphasize the complexity of studying cultural identity, the productiveness

in gaining further research, and make suggestions for appealing research directions.

20
 CHAPTER 2

REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE

Educational systems in Europe were not created spontaneously with the rise of

modern societies. They formed from an array of existing institutions of premodern

establishments such as medieval cathedral schools, church run colleges, Renaissance

universities, academies for the sons and daughters of the nobility, endowed grammar

schools established by rulers and a multitude of non-formal systems (Schriewer, 2000).

A significant feature of modernity, however, is the emergence of the nation-state and of

universal mass schooling, both of which mark decisive transitions toward education as a

modern system. In Europe, these historical developments determined the character of

educational institutions as the project of modern nation building sought to make

congruent political, territorial, cultural and linguistic structures defined in ethnic terms

(Avdela, 2000; Gellner, 1983 in Schriewer, 2000). This was achieved and guaranteed, in

part, by national systems of education wherein schools ensured the formation and

reproduction of a national identity by reinforcing specific ideas of nationalism through

courses on history, language and literature as well as other traditional ways within the

educational system (Avdela, 2000; Dragonas & Frangoudaki, 2000). Other traditional

ways of reinforcing a national identity include school festivals, anniversary celebrations,

21
and excursions to national symbols. Such activities are generally performed year after

year and become somewhat ritualistic. Thus, I believe that establishing rituals is a

primary component of developing a national identity.

Nonetheless, European societies began to face challenges to cultural

homogenization from inside nation-states—with the presence of immigrants, migrant

workers, and non-dominant indigenous groups—and from outside—with processes of

increasing European integration as symbolized by the European Union and the Council of

Europe (Schriewer, 2000, p. 16). These challenges are at the forefront of today’s Europe

as it attempts to achieve a new form of cultural identity defined at the supranational level,

and related to the conscious promotion of a Europeanization of schools. However,

despite a commitment by national governments of the European Union in 1988 to the

introduction of a European dimension into the curricula of their schools, the question as

to whether pressures to preserve historical and national elements in education continues

in European schools.

The central aim of this literature review is to consider the intersectionality of

discourses on nationalism, education and cultural identity. I do so by engaging with

perspectives from the literature that articulate various positions in general and as they

relate to modern Greece. However, with the proliferation of meanings associated with

theories today, the task of defining, or choosing how to discuss a term is a difficult one.

The presence of such plurality of meanings is both stimulating and overwhelming.

Nevertheless, throughout this literature review I attempt to define those terms or ideas

related to them, that are central to my project: nationalism, modern Greece, the European

space, culture, identity, history and history education. As Clifford Geertz (1973) states,

22
“Eclecticism is self-defeating not because there is only one direction in which it is useful

to move, but because there are so many: it is necessary to choose” (p. 5).

NATIONALISM AND MODERN GREECE

For Ernest Gellner, nationalism occurs in the modern period because industrial

societies, unlike agrarian ones, need homogenous languages and cultures in order to work

efficiently (Gellner, 1983). To achieve this, a process of assimilation through public

education is often mobilized. In this review, a consideration of the cultural content of

nationalism, including political culture, myth, identity and collective identity is

highlighted. I begin with a brief historical, and mostly political, narrative of Greece

before 1821. This extraction weighs selected conditions in classical antiquity, the

Byzantine Empire, the Ottoman Empire or Turkokratia,3 and the Greek War of

Independence. The purpose here is to ground my discussion in a historical and cultural

setting, albeit a selected one, and to illustrate Greece’s path through the nationalist

project. Next, I describe different types and processes of nationalism, based on the work

of John Camaroff and Clifford Geertz respectively, as frameworks for emphasizing the

cultural capacity of nationalism. After setting this foundation, I move into the specific

discussion of nationalism as a cultural phenomenon in Greece. In doing so, I consider the

cultural domains of language, literature and history, with an emphasis on the latter. The

section ends with a discussion of the current debate regarding the appropriateness of

nationally constituted societies as meaningful objects of discourse, or units of social and

cultural analysis (King, 1997); i.e., the crisis of the nation-state.

3
Turkokratia, a term that I use throughout the paper, refers to Turkish authority during the Ottoman
empire. Specifically, it comes from the Greek “Turko” meaning “Turk” and “kratia” meaning “rule.”
23
An Historical Narrative of Modern Greece

Greece has long been a part of the European gaze. Generations of travelers,

myself included, have arrived with romantic expectations about the Greeks, only to

discover that their preconceptions are simply anachronistic, often unfair, images.

“Indeed, for the Greeks, the persistence of the Classical image in the West poses a painful

dilemma: how far should they consciously try to live up to it?” (Herzfeld, 1986, p. vii)

On one hand, there are those outside Greece who support the Greek cause in the name of

Classical scholarship. On the other, there is an autochthonous view, one in which Greeks

reflect from within their cultural borders on what it means to be Greek. Both images, the

external and the internal, are constructions of history and culture. Thus, there is not so

much a distinction between “ideal” and “real” Greece as there is between two different

“realities,” two notions of what it means to be Greek (Herzfeld, 1986). Identifying the

criteria shaping these images may begin with a selected narration of Greece from

antiquity to the modern era.

Hellenism typically refers to the period of the pre-Christian Greeks. This includes

the era up to the arrival of Christianity by the Roman emperor Constantine I. However,

the Classical Greek past, narrowly the fifth century BC, is associated, most notably, with

the exalted legacies of democracy, philosophy, arts and architecture.4 It is from this

cultural era that European intellectuals appropriated Greek history and elevated it to the

4
Here, I am compelled to acknowledge the existence of various origin disputes regarding some of these
legacies. However, for the purposes of this particular work, the idea that Europeans of the Renaissance
appropriated an ideal Greece and claimed it as the birthplace of Europe overrides these current disputes. In
other words, I am not interested in disproving evidence such claims. Rather, I am focusing on the idea of
how European intellectuals constructed Greece as the fountainhead of a European space.

24
status of “high culture” within Europe. As a result, the idea of Hellenism became the

cultural exemplar of Europe.

Byzantium was the medieval past of modern Greece. Paradoxically, during this

time, ancient Hellenic culture, associated with paganism, survived simultaneously with

the rise of Christianity as a dominant collective ideology. By the end of the twelfth

century, the Byzantines referred to themselves as Romaioi, or the modern pronunciation

Romioi (Magdalino, 1992, p. 7). “By calling themselves ‘Romans’ rather than Hellenes,

the Byzantines were perhaps symbolically severing themselves from the outgoing

tradition of Hellenism, and emphasizing their adherence to its successor, Christianity”

(Woodhouse, 1992, p. 33). As I discuss later, this controversy over self-designation as

Romioi or Hellene endures and is revived, albeit in a different form from that of

Byzantine signification, during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The relationship

between Hellenism and Christianity posed problems, but the tradition of Hellenism

persisted as Greek literature continued to be studied and attempts were even made to

harmonize Plato and Aristotle with Orthodox theology (Woodhouse, 1992).

In 1453, the Byzantine Empire abruptly ended with the Ottoman conquest. With

the Turkokratia, Hellenic culture was in danger of being extinguished. However, these

traditions were already being transferred to Italy. Chronologically, the last century of

Byzantium coincides more or less with the first century of the Western Renaissance.

This is important since a major feature of the Renaissance was the study of Greek and

Latin. And it was from the places that experienced the European Renaissance—Italy,

Germany, France, Netherlands, England—that eventually Hellenism returned to Greece

(ibid.). But in Greece itself, Hellenism was on pause as the Greeks were cut off from

25
their medieval past by four hundred years of Turkish occupation. Interestingly, it was

only after independence, when Greek intellectuals discovered the need to create

continuity between ancient and modern Greece and use it as support for their irredentist

aspirations, that they included Byzantium in the picture (Herzfeld, 1986).

The symbolic quality of official dates in history, such as March 25th in Greece,5

remind us that they are embedded with significance and meaning rather that the

designation of a single event. Thus, it comes as no surprise that freedom from Ottoman

authority was not restored everywhere in Greece on a single day.6 Regardless, at

independence, the Greeks found themselves in a position familiar to all groups who have

overcome the subjugation of foreign rule, i.e., the nationalist project.

Types and Processes of Nationalism

In describing nationalism, the distinction between a nation and a state is

meaningful. While a nation claims to be a cultural social group, often imagined as

homogeneous, a state is a legal and political organization with the power to require

obedience and loyalty from its members. It is a major political sub-division of the globe

today (Danforth, 1995). However, to understate the direct, and erstwhile, role that culture

plays in nation building is precisely to focus on the political events, those which capture

the attention of the world, and to abate those cultural processes which are perhaps less

spectacular for a people seeking changes. Indeed, the dramas of public events, such as

5
March 25 is Independence Day in Greece.
6
According to Woodhouse, “The Greeks began to lose territory to foreign enemies as early as the eleventh
century and the process of subjugation to foreign rule was not completed until the conquest of Crete in the
seventeenth century by the Turks…[Additionally], almost every part of Greece had a quite different
experience of foreign rule.”
26
the declaration of independence, have the power of obscuring the cultural foundations on

which they rested as well as those that continued after them.

Giddens describes nationalism as “a phenomenon that is primarily psychological”

in that acts of collective remembering and forgetting are necessary for the existence of

the nation (Giddens, 1981). Thus, much of the literature describes the nationalism

imagination as constructed around the first person plural “we” to create a nation and a

population with a national identity. Furthermore, this population must be taught who

they are, where they come from, and where they are going (Dragonas & Bar-On, 2000).

In the book, Politics of Difference: Ethnic Premises in a World of Power, John

Camaroff presents Hans Kohn’s position that “[n]ationalism is first and foremost a state

of mind…an act of consciousness” (Wilmsen & McAllister, 1994, p. 166). With this

position, he outlines three different types of nationalism in an attempt to understand some

of the troubling questions about collective attachments. He describes the first type as

ethnonationalism. This type of nationalism celebrates cultural particularity, claims a

special bond and grants membership by ascription that works to ensure a deep emotional

attachment. It defines legal and political jurisdiction in territorial forms by having it

correspond to geographical borders and it accords itself a historical origin with a master

narrative. The second type, Euronationalism, imagines a secular state founded on

universalist principles of citizenship and a social contract. While the control of a

sovereign territory is not necessary in this type of nationalism, it tends to demand the

allegiance of its subjects wherever they are, thus taking on a transnational character with

strong and active diasporas. It accords itself primordial roots and essentialist traits and

locates its origins in narratives of the heroic. It is a historical construction and it seems

27
most persuasively illuminated by one or more forms of constructionism.7 Camaroff

describes the third type as heteronationalism wherein a synthesis is at work to absorb

ethnonational identity politics within a Euronationalist conception of political

community. Thus, it is somewhat of a blurring of the first two types. Couched in the

language of pluralism, its objective is to accommodate cultural diversity within a civil

society composed of autonomous citizens who are equal and undifferentiated before the

law. However, he is careful to warn against the seduction of this type of nationalism by

reminding us that the redistribution of authority, the dissolution of existing hegemonies,

and the removal of inequalities is rarely accomplished without resistance (Camaroff,

1996, p. 175-180).

While John Camaroff defines types of nationalism, Clifford Geertz describes a

useful way of understanding the process of nationalism. While keeping the limitations of

periodization in mind, he attempt to divide the process of nationalism into four phases,

whereby nationalism may be conceptualized as the complex interconnection of political

and cultural phenomena. In this way, both theorists are working with political and

cultural components of the nationalist discourse, but from differing perspectives.

According to Geertz, the first phase in the process of nationalism is that wherein the

nationalist movement forms and crystallizes; second, that in which a people triumph;

third, that in which they organize themselves into states; and finally, that in which,

7
The three types of constructionism to which Camaroff is referring are (1) cultural constructionism which
sees the formation of groups as a function of their shared symbols and signifying practices, but tends to
treat culture as a closed system, and so does not begin to grasp the complexities of power and
representation in a multicultural world, (2) political constructionism which focuses on the ways elites
fashion ideologies, images, and social knowledge and then impose them, hegemonically, on the nation-
state, and (3) radical historicism which follows Marxist ideology in ascribing the creation of social
identities to processes of labor that inscribe material inequities in cultural differences (Camaroff, 1996,
p.165).
28
organized into states, they find themselves obliged to define and stabilize their

relationships both to other states and to themselves (Geertz, 1973, p. 238). It is the

dynamics of the first and fourth stages, where nationalism may be described as a cultural

enterprise, in which I am most interested for this project.

Like nationalism, culture is defined in a variety of ways in the literature. Anthony

King (1997), in his introduction to Culture, Globalization and the World System, broadly

defines two different aspects of culture: “anthropological” notions of culture, i.e., ways of

life, values, beliefs, attitudes, structures of power; and “humanistic” notions of culture,

i.e., a whole range of aesthetic practices. This perspective suggests that culture as

aesthetic practices, both draws from and participates in the construction of culture as a

way of life that, in turn, affects culture as a creative, representational practice. It

emphasizes the interconnectedness of different aspects of culture and bridges what is

often a gap between different meanings for culture.

Another definition, one taking into account both the conceptualization and

analysis of culture, is Clifford Geertz notion of “webs of significance.” From The

Interpretation of Cultures (1973), he states,

Believing, with Max Weber, that man is an animal suspended in webs of

significance he himself has spun, I take culture to be those webs, and the
analysis of it to be therefore not an experimental science in search of law
but an interpretive one in search of meaning (p. 5).

I find these two conceptualizations of culture complementarily encompassing.

King’s reference to culture as ‘ways of life’ and ‘aesthetics’ weighs the complexity of

culture. Equally, Geertz’ reference to ‘significance,’ ‘interpretive,’ and ‘meaning’

suggest that culture is dynamic wherein meaning lies neither in a sender nor a receiver,

29
but in both. Combined, culture is not individual and one-way, but complex, active,

relational and rhizomatic. By considering the different types of nationalism as described

by Camaroff and situating the discourse of nationalism and its cultural dimension in

Geertz’s first and fourth stages, it is possible to explore ways in which cultural

enterprises in Greece first built and crystallized the nationalist movement and then took

part in defining the nation vis-à-vis the West and themselves.

Nationalism as a Cultural Phenomenon in Greece

The Greek War of Independence was fought between 1821 and 1833 (Clogg,

1992). However, the campaign for national sovereignty began before the outbreak of war

between the Greeks and the Ottoman Turks. Equally important, the general impetus for

nationalism in Greece may be described as a process of comparison and thus, belatedness

(Jusdanis, 1991; 2001). During the Ottoman occupation, Greek intellectuals began to

travel to European cities and discover the vast gaps in culture that separated them from

the West. Thus, it was the work of Greek intellectuals, mainly outside Greece, who

served not as fighters on the battlefield, but as historians, interpreters, poets, and teachers

(Herzfeld 1985; Tziovas, 1997; Jusdanis, 1991; 2001).

As a result of the devastating comparisons they made between their own

society and western Europe, out of which their own society emerged as
inferior and backward, they undertook a project of social reconstruction
[that would lead, politically, to the end of Ottoman domination in Greece].
(Jusdanis, 2001, p. 9).

Greek intellectuals of the eighteenth century, following Western models,

envisioned a national community distinguished by language (Jusdanis, 1991; Sifakis,

1992). Debatably, language is seen as the most important aspect of creating a collective

30
imagined community (Anderson, 1991). In Greece, a series of debates related to national

identity and the language question ensued. Remarkably, the most recent milestone of

these debates took place within the last twenty years.

Nationalism taught them to think of themselves in this way. This is the

whole idea, as Anderson insists, behind the invention of the imagined
community. It brings individuals together in a common social experience
which becomes the space for the acquisition of their shared identity. It
enables people to relate to one another on the basis of a linguistic unity
and a canon of stories (Jusdanis, 1991, p. 33).

Another step in this cultural process was the creation of a “canon of stories,” a

national literature. Creating an autochthonous literary canon became the work of Greek

writers in the struggle to construct a national identity and a Greek nationalism. Literature

became “…both a manifestation of the nation as well as part of the nation-forming

process” (Jusdanis, 1991, p. 47). Finally, the invention of a national narrative, a

distinguished history that linked ancient and modern Greece, and allowed Greeks to

imagine themselves as a united people of common descent rather than as subordinates of

an unjust, foreign rule was invented. This is the creation of a national myth.

Although I seem to present the above cultural domains—history, language, and

literature—as a linear and progressive formation, this is a misleading presentation

Nationalism as a cultural enterprise is not linear and progressive. Instead, it is a process

formed around many focal points, confluent and divergent, all constructing themselves

around the idea of nationalism, sometimes in tandem, sometimes not. Also, the

appropriation of national language and literature presuppose many circumstances, not

least a privileging of text over oral traditions, questions of who is being silenced, and

categories of access among them and they have been prominent cultural forces in the

31
development of nationalism in Greece. However, the various ways in which history has

been used to advance particular views about nationalism is emphasized in the following

section.

Creating a National Myth

History is a crucial element to nations and ethnic groups in the process of making

themselves (Danforth, 1995). Clearly, it must be acknowledged that the historical

process necessarily involves the selection of “facts” in a construction of a national

narrative.8 Therefore, the selection of facts inescapably involves interpretation and the

knowledge to discern between productive and futile forms of historical selection is not an

objective practice.

Through the discourse of Hellenism, Greek intellectuals represented Greeks as the

heirs of classical antiquity. This process, however, began long before independence.

Intellectuals such as Alexandros Mavrokordatos (1636-1709) and Evgenios Voulgaris

(1716-1806) merely brought them into the public, and political, arena. Mavrokordatos,

who studied in Rome, was an early modernizer who sought an education outside the

Ottoman Empire. However, the Patriarchate, a major figure in cultural production for

Greeks at this time, resisted the new ideas that he and others brought back to Greece.

Foremost was Mavokordatos’s idea of an existing struggle between the Ancients and

Moderns (Jusdanis, 2001). Subsequently, it was Voulgaris who advocated the alignment

between modern and ancient Greece that was the seed for a common descent among

8
I put “facts” in quotation marks because I am not suggesting the idea that there is a set of events in the
past that depicts one reality of that past. Rather, I use the term to refer to a “set of constructs” about the
past.
32
Greek-speaking subjects of the Ottoman Empire. After him, Greek intellectuals began to

construct a continuous narrative from ancient, to Byzantine, to modern Greece, regarding

themselves as the true descendents of the ancient Greeks. And because Western Europe

had appropriated ancient Greek culture during the Enlightenment, the connection

between ancient and modern Greece conveniently made the subjugation of Greeks a

European concern as well (Herzfeld, 1987).9

As anthropologist Michael Herzfeld points out, in a strictly literal sense, no

culture remains totally unaltered with the passage of time. As generations succeed

generations, all kinds of changes occur. Thus, “a premise of cultural continuity cannot

usefully be regarded as a question of pure fact” (Herzfeld, 1985, p. 3). However, he

avoids the practice of exposing a culture’s “ignorance” about their cultural universe in

favor of attempting to say something about how they perceive and articulate that culture

(ibid., p. 10). Rather than challenging the factual basis of nationalist ideas of cultural

continuity, he suggests that the Greek narrative of continuity served as a cultural force in

the development of an imagined collective Greek identity before, during and after the

establishment of the nation-state.

A Greek myth of continuity is powerful in constructing positive feelings of

belonging, ardor and patriotism as well as attitudes of xenophobia and ethnocentrism.

Taken together, persuasion via language, literature and history have the power to be more

9
This type of appropriation of cultural capital, extracted from peripheral areas such as Greece for
“consumption” in the centers of Europe is not unlike the flow of immigrants in today’s era of globalization
whose identities are transformed in the transnational spaces that they enter. M. Kearney (1995) discusses
this idea in his discussion of transnationalism and globalization. He sites an example of the transnational
transformation of the tango as a working-class dance from Argentina that was exported to Europe where it
was refined, or “re-class-ified,” and then imported in this genteel form to Japan, while also being recycled
back to Argentina as a national symbol appropriated by proletarians and elites alike in a neocolonial
context (p. 554).
33
insidious than coercion via political means. While the latter generally provokes some

measure of resentment and resistance, skillful persuasion of a national culture can,

perhaps, avoid planting these seeds, insofar as it may lead its subjects to desire, or think

they desire, for themselves precisely what the nationalist ideology desires of them

(Lincoln, 1991).

Crisis of the Nation-State

Central to the process of myth-making is the development of the nation-state.

However, the viability of the nation-state is being destabilized today. Questions such as:

Is the centrality of nationalism in defining identity weakening? Does globalization imply

cultural homogenization? Is the nation-state an appropriate organizing structure for

studying culture? These are the debates raised about nationalism, ethnicity and border

studies in both anthropology (Appadurai, Hannerz, Geertz) and cultural studies

(Wallerstein, King, Hall, Robertson, Bhabba). However, is it safe to write the obituary of

the nation-state? According to Anthony King in Culture, Globalization and the World-

System, despite the different positions taken by cultural studies academics, all share, to a

greater or lesser extent the rejection of the nationally constituted society as the

appropriate object of discourse, or unit of social and cultural analysis (King, 1997, p.

viii). Indeed, nationalism in the modern world has been given a negative reputation by

some, and to a great extent, it is well deserved.

Between them (and sometimes in combination) religious bigotry and

nationalist hatred have probably brought more havoc upon humanity than
any two forces in history, and doubtless will bring a great deal more. Yet
also rather like religion, nationalism has been a driving force in some of

34
 the most creative changes in history, and doubtless will be so again in
many yet to come (Geertz, 2000, pp. 253-4).

While it is easy to produce both destructive and creative forces within the domain

of nationalism—the Janus face of nationalism—as described by Homi Bhabba (1990),

this is not convincing enough to conclude that it is ineffectual in the study of culture. On

the contrary, it seems a more productive enterprise to study why nationalism takes the

forms that it does, such as nationalism as a cultural phenomenon, in both the pursuit of

meaning and in critical enterprises as well.10 A commitment to conceptualizing the

“world as a single place” as Robertson does, or “world citizenship” as does Martha

Nussbaum, may have productive potential for defamiliarizing homogenous, state-centric,

binary, and Western assumptions in a way that envisions a more complex world space.

Correspondingly, the same may be done in the postnational imaginary. Two points

resound. First, culture, as “webs of significance that we ourselves have spun” speaks to a

need for analysis of those “significant webs” that society has created. This includes the

discourse of nationalism. At the same time, no discourse should be taken as a grand

narrative that may be used to explain everything.

Clearly, the growth of transnational communities, social movements, and

institutions—be it Islamic fundamentalism, African diasporas, or the
European Union—is also eating away at the boundedness of the nation-
state, and fueling its current crises of legitimation and regulation
(Comaroff, 1996, p. 170).

It is hardly contestable that the terrain of nationalism is being re-mapped. However, it is

the very experience of re-mapping the world onto a global terrain that intensifies an

awareness of local cultures, national or otherwise, and, in the process, reinforces its

10
See Comaroff’s (1996) interesting discussion of the difference between “Euronationalism,”
“ethnonationalism” and “heteronationalism,” all of which are couched in the discourse of “nationalism”
(pp. 175-180).
35
discourse (p. 174). Thus, while it is a disservice to discount the challenging questions

about nationalism and its changing role in a global era, it is equally idle to disregard it as

a meaningful and appropriate object of discourse or unit of social and cultural analysis.

CONSTRUCTING A NEW EUROPEAN SPACE

In 2003, a select group of politicians, artists, patrons, academics and journalists

from many countries and every part of Europe gathered in Hamburg, Germany to discuss

a variety of issues related to the past, present and future of Europe. The Round Table

discussion, “Reinventing Europe-Cultural Dimensions of Widening and Deepening,”

sought to discuss European culture in its present state. The first part of the discussion

“established an extensive definition of the foundations of European culture, and therefore

of Europe’s image of its place in the world” (Bergdorf Round Table, 2003, p. 19). Topics

centered on themes of culture, origins and space as exemplified in the following

questions: What is European culture and is there even such a thing in these times of

cultural globalization? What continuing significance do those traditions have that we

associate with places such as Jerusalem, Athens, and Rome? Is Europe a definite space

or is it an idea? The second session “built on these very basic foundations to identify the

challenges facing cultural policy in the enlargement and consolidation of the European

Union” (ibid., p. 19). According to participants, this part of the discussion yielded the

consensus that culture and the cultural Europeanization of the region will play a central

part in the process of European integration (ibid., p. 20).

36
 And Paul Valery, in his study of the definition of the word “European,”

recognizes three common elements, symbolically represented by Athens, Rome and

Jerusalem, to which people often refer in describing the word.

Athens stands for the ancient Greek tradition of thought based on the
rationality of the thinking mind. Rome’s heritage is that of local
administration and, last but not least, Jerusalem symbolizes Judeo-
Christian spirituality (Ahrweiler, in Reinventing Europe, p. 25).

Although few would agree that Europe has become a kind of United States of

Europe, and the foundations by which Valery defines “European” are arguably elitist and

exclusionary, there is certain agreement in the literature that Europe has undergone and

continues to undergo unprecedented changes that are exposing, questioning and

defamiliarizing dominant assumptions of the European project. A productive way of

approaching an understanding of the concept of Europe is to examine its processes.

Thus, this section examines some of the processes of Europe, European integration and

the Europeanization of education and productively works within, against and beyond

them as presented in the literature. I start with a discussion of the European Union as an

imagined community and the discourses that construct this transnational space. Next, I

describe specific ways in which Hellenic identity is constructed within this imagined

space. Finally, I examine the means by which a European dimension in education is

being constructed in the European space.

The European Union as an Imagined Community

The emergence of postnational and transnational societies, such as the European

Union, are often presented as matters of necessity and globalization appears to be an

37
inexorable force in this process (Calhoun, 2002). European integration, for example, is

often sold as a necessary response to the global integration of capital. In 1946, close to

the end of the Second World War, Churchill spoke at the University in Zurich where he

announced, “We must build a kind of United States of Europe…If Europe is to be saved

from infinite misery and indeed from final doom, there must be this act of faith in the

European family” (Churchill, 1946). However, assumptions about a European space

warns that projects of unification may be set forth on the cultivation of homogeneity and

continuity, leaving little room for heterogeneity and contradiction. These assumptions,

resting in the rhetoric of common interests, are taken up later in the study.

Globalization is broadly defined as “the intensification of world-wide social

relations which link distant localities in such a way that local happenings are shaped by

events occurring many miles away and vice-versa” (Kearney, 1995, p. 548). Major

themes in the globalization literature that I have identified may be summarized as (1) a

questioning of the role of the nation-states, (2) tensions and/or dialectics between local

and global forces, (3) deterritorialization and re-conceptualizing borders, and (4) decays

in the center to periphery model. Clearly, these themes overlap and work as integral, but

not necessarily equal or decided, parts of a whole process. Specifically, economic and

cultural globalization are primary descriptors used to describe the processes by which

societies, particularly European, are increasingly linked (Arnove, 1999, p. 2). Economic

globalization, narrowly defined, is the result of transformations in the processes of

producing and distributing goods and services (p. 2). Central to these economic

processes is the diffusion of space. An obvious example in Europe is the creation of the

European Economic Community and the introduction of the Euro as its members’ shared

38
currency. Cultural globalization processes, which are defamiliarizing relationships

between identity, space and difference, coincide with this highly globalized capitalism.

An example of cultural globalization within the European space is the creation of the

European Union wherein common institutions are set up to which members delegate

some of their sovereignty so that decisions on matters of joint interest can be made at a

European, rather than national, level. This pooling of sovereignty may be seen as

culturally integrating member-states. In the realm of education in many parts of Europe,

both economic and cultural globalization processes are intertwining agendas as they

require educators to recognize how forces from all areas of the world previously

considered distant and remote impinge upon national curricula. As Arnove and Torres

(1999) suggest,

…there is a dialectic at work by which these global processes interact with

national and local actors and contexts to be modified and, in some cases,
transformed. There is a process of give-and-take, an exchange by which
international trends are reshaped to local ends (pp. 2-3).

Benedict Anderson describes the nation as “an imagined political

community—and imagined as both inherently limited and sovereign” (Anderson, 1991, p.

6). He describes that it is imagined because the members of the nation are not necessarily

in contact with each other, but nevertheless believe themselves to constitute a community

with some unique collective fate. In this collective imagination, the nation is established

as a community because there is a conceived camaraderie. “Ultimately it is this fraternity

that makes it possible, over the past two centuries, for so many millions of people, not so

much to kill, as willing to die for such limited imaginings (ibid., p. 7). In the same way,

Ernest Renan describes the nation as “the culmination of a long past of endeavors,

39
sacrifice, and devotion…and, indeed, suffering in common unifies more than joy does”

(Renan, 1990, p. 19).

Thus, the eighteenth century marks the movement of the age of nationalism in

Western Europe (11) as well as the dawn of rational, reason-guided thought described by

the Enlightenment (St. Pierre, 2000). However, Anderson does not attempt to prove that

nationalism somehow superseded religion, the fountainhead of thought prior to this time.

Instead, what he proposes is that “nationalism has to be understood by aligning it, not

with self-consciously held political ideologies, but with the large cultural systems that

preceded it, out of which—as well as against which—it came into being” (Anderson,

1991, p. 12). Thus, the convergence of various cultural systems, such as language,

values, historical narratives and print technology, helped create the possibility of a new

form of imagined community (p. 46). Here, he stresses the crucial role played not by

political developments, which surely have a firm footing in the processes of nationalism,

but by cultural processes in forging imaged bonds between people, territory and ideals.

The nation coming into being as a shared affiliation to an imagined community

brings the discussion back to the question of whether nationalism is likely to be

transcended amidst the forces of globalization discussed in the previous section. In other

words, will the intensification of social relations and linking of distant localities caused

by global flows lead to an imagined world community that replaces the roles of the

nation-state? The European Union is one such attempt at a transnational community.

However, does this necessarily imply a rejection of the nationally constituted society as a

meaningful object of discourse or unit of cultural analysis?

40
 At present, it appears that nationalism is in an ambiguous state and perhaps

indefinitely so. In the political and cultural discourses of Western Europe, it is uncertain

whether the European Union will resemble an alliance of nations, each retaining its own

national independence, or whether it is moving towards a Europe that will resemble a

supra-national organization, thus creating a different political and cultural space. This

uncertainty warrants examining the very construction of “the West” in order to

contribute meaningfully to an understanding of the processes of European unification. I

turn to Edward Said’s theory of Orientalism for this consideration.

Rendering “the West”

What is “the West?” Is it a concrete geographical space, an imagined cultural or

ideological space, or is it something entirely different? Theories beginning in the late

eighteenth century that aimed at creating a binary opposition between Occident and

Orient begin to address these questions. Edward Said’s (1978) Orientalism discourse11

describes how the Orient has been one of the poles of difference that has given the West

fundamental elements of its identity, and especially its continuing sense of superiority

mainly as differences turn into weaknesses. Thus, the West becomes that which is not

Oriental. Specifically, the West, broadly embodying cultures of Northern and Western

Europe and the United States, gains strength and identity by setting itself against the

Orient, or cultures outside the West. What the discourse represents, as Said deftly

11
Said designates Orientalism a discourse by employing Foucault’s notion of a discourse. He contends
that “without examining Orientalism as a discourse one cannot possibly understand the enormously
systematic discipline by which European culture was able to manage—and even produce—the Orient
politically, sociologically, militarily, ideologically, scientifically, and imaginatively during the post-
Enlightenment period” (Said, 1978, p. 873).

41
explains, has less to do with the Orient than it does with the political, intellectual, cultural

and moral powers that are produced by and exist in Western culture (Said, 1978, p. 874).

He designates Orientalism as a discourse by employing Foucault’s notion of a discourse

and contends that “without examining Orientalism as a discourse one cannot possibly

understand the enormously systematic discipline by which European culture was able to

manage—and even produce—the Orient politically, sociologically, militarily,

ideologically, scientifically, and imaginatively during the post-Enlightenment period”

(ibid., p. 873).12

Once the Orient is thought of as a “Western projection” (ibid., p. 878), then the

West’s knowledge of the Orient becomes the Orient. Likewise, that which is non-

Oriental becomes the West. In other words, “Orientalist notions influenced the people

who were called Orientals as well as those called Occidental, European, or Western”

(ibid., p. 881). In short, perception becomes reality. This demarcation between East and

West, although an imagined distinction, was created by two principal elements according

to Said. One was a growing systematic knowledge in Europe about the Orient,

knowledge reinforced by the colonial encounter as well as by the widespread interest in

the alien and unusual, exploited by the developing sciences…[and] a sizable body of

literature produced by novelists, poets, translators, and travelers. The other feature of

Oriental-European relations was that Europe was always in a position of strength and

domination. True the relationship could be disguised or mitigated…But the essential

relationship, on political, cultural, and even religious grounds, was seen—in the West,

12
Foucault’s definition of a discourse is “…a limited number of statements for which a group of conditions
of existence can be defined” (Foucault, 1972, pp. 116-7).
42
which is what concerns us here—to be one between a strong and a weak partner (ibid., p.

880).

Depicting the West in this context assumes an epistemological notion of binary

Otherness and authority. It is set up as a contrast between “the familiar (Europe, the

West, “us”) and the strange (the Orient, the East, “them”). In short, a concept such as “the

West” is an ideologically imbued construct produced in discourse and constantly

mobilized and used as if it were real (Wolff , 2000). And this vision, in a sense, created

and then served the two worlds thus conceived” (Said, 1978, p. 883). As a result, the

West is formed in and represented by persuasive claims to status, control and the

establishment of difference through regulations and precepts. As such, the Orient and its

“objects” of study are essentially fixed, thus a-historical in this sense, instead of being

defined “as all other beings, states, nations, peoples, and cultures—as a product…of the

forces operating in the field of historical evolution” (ibid., p. 885). This sets up a binary

conception of cultural identity for those who identify themselves as Europeans.

The New Identity Project

Traditionally, the meaning of Europe in the Greek educational context addresses

issues of cultural identity by regarding the intimacy between Greece and Europe as

drawing from European romanticism (Zambeta, 2000). According to this viewpoint,

Greek antiquity has been of foremost in the construction of European civilization and

continues to offer a collective bond between people who identify themselves as

Europeans (Arweile,r 2000). As Evi Zambeta (2000) describes:

43
 This approach…has offered the main argument for the formation of the
Greek national identity and for the construction of the official version of
history which is taught at the Greek school till today (p.1).

As such, “having a history,” in the sense of being able to claim one’s own

antiquity and a continuous narrative deriving from it, became a widespread symbol of

nationalism during the 19th century (Anderson, 1983). In Europe, these historical

developments determined the character of educational institutions by which the project of

modern nation building consisted in making congruent political, territorial, cultural and

linguistic structures (Avdela, 2000; Gellner 1983 in Schriewer, 2000). Thus, national

educational systems were employed, and continue to take part in producing and

perpetuating a homogeneous nationalism imagination. Indeed, the state-mandated history

curriculum in Greece still “concentrates heavily on a traditional national narrative which

gives little space for methodological variety and topics that are not directly related to the

history of the Greek people and state” (Pingel, 2001, p. 210).

Not unique to Greece, history, literature and language have been used to teach a

population who they are, where they come from and where they are going (Avdela, 2000;

Dragonas & Frangoudaki, 2000; Dragonas & Bar-On, 2000). Thus, it may be supposed

that school history in Greece and elsewhere is an important factor in may contexts. It

may be an influential part of individual and collective identity, it may have a bearing on

values and interests, and it may influence attitudes and actions (Angvik, 1997).

Currently, the European integration process, of which Greece is a part, is

emerging as a new identity project in many respects (van der Leeuw-Roord, 2001).

Specifically, there have been careful considerations at the educational level to avoid a

homogenizing design wherein nation-states ignore and play down differences. European

44
slogans such as “unity in diversity,” “Europe of the regions” and “Europe of the people”

suggest a different course for the identity project (Macdonald, 2002), one that attempts to

move away from binary oppositions, and are reflected in various European Union policy

guidelines, including the principle of subsidiarity and the European dimension in

education.13 It must not be overlooked, however, that the new European identity project

has many similarities to nationalist projects before it, including the cultivation of a

collective identity.

The subsidiarity principle requires that decisions within the European Union be

taken at levels as close to the national, regional or local level as possible (Bergedorf

Round Table, 2003). Applied to education, the principle advocates that the European

community encourage cooperation between member states by supporting and

supplementing their actions while fully respecting the responsibility of individual

member states for the content and organization of their educational systems (CEC, 1992).

Thus, the principle makes it clear that national educational systems are protected from

supranational decisions in educational matters. In this framework, decisions to

implement initiatives remain at the local level (Ryba, 2000). Likewise, the European

dimension in education included for young Europeans the ambitious goals of (1)

strengthening a European identity, (2) preparation for participation in the European

Union, (3) greater awareness of the advantages and challenges that living in the European

Union represent, and (4) improved knowledge of all member states’ historical, cultural,

13
Creating a national imagination involves the operation of power, typically involving the hegemonic
dominance of one part over the other. Taking this into consideration, while European Union policy
suggests “unity in diversity,” one cannot ignore that the European Union already claims to be the central
area of Europe, the very notion of “Europe.” In other words, “Europe” is equivalent to the “European
Union” in a majority of discussions from the literature (Dragonas & Bar-On, 2000).
45
economic, and social aspects (CEC, 1988). Recent research on history textbooks

suggests that the combination of the subsidiarity principle and European dimension have

not established a common course of action. On the contrary, they have had widely

varying effects on educational systems in Europe and likewise, on the construction of a

collective European identity among European youth (see Boystov, 2001; Tutiaux-

Guillon, 2001; von Borries, 2001; Pingel, 2001). In using the term “identity,” this

analysis employs a subjectivity-based discourse wherein identity is viewed as relational

rather than individual, as changing rather than static, multiple rather than singular. Thus,

the identity discourse discussed here is part of a poststructural theoretical framework

wherein language and symbols construct representations of their cultural identities.

Today in Europe, social and political status is often associated with membership

in the European Union. According to Dragonas and Bar-On in their article, “National

Identity Among a Neighboring Quartet: The Case of Greeks, Turks, Israelis and

Palestinians,” the European Union already claims to be the central area of Europe, the

very notion of “Europe.” In other words, “Europe” is equivalent to the “European

Union” (p. 343).14 In addition, the emphasis on “unity in diversity,” not necessarily an

attempt to move away for the Orient-Occident dichotomy, responds to challenges in

uniting the immensely diverse cultures inside the European space. While it accepts

diversity as an asset and asserts that European identity is not being constructed by

abolishing national differences (Tulasiewicz & Brock, 2000, pp. 15-17), it is uncertain

whether national curricula, where cultural reproduction is historically a central aim, leave

14
Likewise, the European Union assumes control over the people in Europe in select bodies such as the
European Council (15 Heads of State), Council of the European Union (Ministers from member states),
European Commission (20 members), European Parliament (626 members), and Court of Justice (15 judges
to monitor compliance to EU policies).
46
room for subordinated groups to challenge dominant forces. By subordinated groups, I

refer to both indigenous and immigrant minorities within cultural or national borders

(e.g., Flemish in Belgium, Turks in Germany) as well as peripheral nations in Europe

(e.g., Greece). As Christine Fox (1999) states,

Identity is not fixed, nor is identity a single definable “condition.” Yet the
construction of identity can be the construction of inequalities, as well as a
powerful force in transforming the structures that seek to reduce the
identity of Otherness to a single, stereotyped dimension (p. 139).

“In the case of a national Greek identity, at least in the “official” version

reproduced in schools, the nation is understood to be a natural, unified, eternal, and

unchanging entity, not a product of history (Avdela, 2000). Analysis of history textbooks

shows that this historical account is created through selective social memory, which

conceals and omits all those crucial elements that might disturb the image of continuity

and homogeneity” (ibid., p. 248). As such, ideas of tradition and modernity in the

context of a Greek culture are ideologically conceptualized through chosen historical

links between Greece and Europe. While the tradition side of this dichotomy focuses on

nationalism and the preservation of a Greek identity, it does not imply a rejection of

European culture (Zambeta, 2000). In other words, the cultural intimacy between Greece

and Europe remains fully intact within the context of the tradition/modernity deliberation.

On the other hand, if modernization discourse perceives the European Union as a political

entity representing the stability, development and security of its citizens, it must also be

expected that the EU contribute in Greece’s prosperity and to strengthening its place in

the European community. In this context, both Hellenocentrism and Eurocentrism are

central characteristics of Greek culture (ibid.). Thus, any conceptualization of cultural

47
identity in Greece must rest on a framework that understands identity as existing as a

relationship between these two characteristics. Thus, the conceptualization of cultural

identity in Greece seems to be situated around a dichotomous arrangement between

“Greece” and “Europe.”

HISTORY AND HISTORY EDUCATION

In order to investigate students’ understandings of Europe in my case study, I

focus my research on the teaching and learning of history at Anatolia College. Thus, it is

appropriate to say something about the field of history itself, and to give a general picture

of the current state of history education in Greece. In the first part of this section, I

discuss theoretical debates within the discipline of history and compare school history

with other kinds of history in order to emphasize the didactic purposes for teaching and

learning history in school.

The Postmodern Historical Debate

“’The life which is unexamined is not worth living.’ So Plato insists; and it is

arguable that ‘unexamined history’ similarly is not worth doing” (Southgate 1996, 1).

While a popular view of history tends to smooth out the contours of the past, brushing

away its inconsistencies, a more useful view is one that conceptualizes history as a

complex interaction of past and present. Since E.H. Carr, in What is History? (1961),

suggested that history “is a continuous process of interaction between the historian and

his facts, an unending dialogue between the present and past,” there has arisen a steady

flow of attempts to describe and understand history from more than simply a study of the

48
past. Thus, the idea of unexamined history is at the heart of theoretical debates about

history today. Simply stated, the debate revolves around modernist versus postmodern

conceptions of historical knowledge and methods. As Keith Jenkins states,

Today we live within the general condition of postmodernity. We do not

have a choice about this. For postmodernity is not an ‘ideology’ or a
position we can choose to subscribe to or not; postmodernity is precisely
our condition: it is our fate (Jenkins, 1995, p. 6).

He goes on to describe the cause of this condition as one related to a general failure in the

experiment of modernity, an experiment arising in Europe around the eighteenth century

which sought the application of reason, science and technology in all areas of social

formations (Jenkins, 1995). Such a shift has given rise to a healthy skepticism towards

all sorts of epistemological and ontological theories. Thus, history’s attempt to follow

Herotodus’ goal “to record the truth about the past” has been undermined by the

discourses of postmodernism and postcolonialism.

Considering this postmodern debate, the definition of history as the study of the

past and as a representation of the past as it was is simply unsatisfactory and

anachronous for several reasons. First, the concept of truth is hardly called into question

and this leads to the presupposed existence of an objective historical truth that can be

uncovered to reveal the past ‘as it was’ (Southgate, 1996, p. 8). Underlying such a view

is the idea that there is a past reality just waiting to be uncovered or discovered by the

historian. Within the postmodern context, the very concept of truth is defamiliarized and

the idea of a single, agreed-upon Truth is transformed into the idea of multiple truthS.

Richard Rorty makes the point that when the idea that truth was made or invented rather

than found began to take hold of the imagination in Europe, two important ideas began to

49
be articulated. First was the repudiation of the view that anything had an inherent nature

to be expressed or represented. Second, there began a distinction between the claim that

the world is out there and the claim that truth is out there (Rorty, 1989).

Truth cannot be out there—cannot exist independently of the human

mind—because sentences cannot so exist, or be out there. The world is
out there, but descriptions of the world are not. Only descriptions of the
world can be true or false. The world on its own—unaided by the
describing activities of human beings—cannot (ibid, p.5).

Similarly, the definition of history as a representation of the past as it was is

bound up in modernist notions of accuracy and objectivity, i.e., a belief in the accuracy

and objectivity of the historian (Jenkins, 1995). Post-positivist theories question the

absolute validity of such concepts and propose new approaches that tend to conclude that

there can never be one single privileged position from which a story of the past can

finally be told. Hayden White, when he points to the inescapable present-centeredness

and positional nature of all historical interpretations and readings, alludes to the

impossibility of history as an accurate and objective account of the past and towards the

fictive aspect of history. As he puts it:

If we recognize that there is a fictive element in all historical narrative, we

would find in the theory of language and narrative itself the basis for a
more subtle presentation of what historiography consists of than that
which simply tells the student to go and ‘find out the facts’ and write them
up in such a way as to tell ‘what really happened’ (White, 1978, p. 99).

Richard Rorty and Hayden White both are working from within the philosophical

development known as the linguistic turn, or the recognition that history is a narrative

about the past written in the here and now, rather than some distanced mirror of it

(Munslow, 2001). This view that history is a narrative of the past constructed by

historians of the present challenges, without dismissing, the discipline’s empirical-

50
analytical foundations and recognizes that historical narratives are self-evidently

authored. Alun Munslow (2001) describes that the emphasis now is less on history as a

process of objective discovery and report but rather accepts its unavoidably fictive nature,

that is, its literary constructedness. He goes on to say that

Postmodern history, because it is a literary as much as an empirical

project, recognizes it cannot escape its authorship. In other words, the
past is not just re-interpreted according to new evidence but also through
self-conscious acts of re-writing as well. Thus it is that history and the
past cannot coincide to the extent that the former, whether we like it or
not, is principally a narrative about the latter (ibid.).

The postmodern condition builds suspicion around modernist historical practices

in a way that deems them unsatisfactory. It forces us to face up to the highly complex

question of how we know things about the past. Munslow points out that postmodern

historians ask many fresh questions. Are facts best thought of as events under a

description? Is all data ultimately textual and, if so, what are its implications? Should

history be written primarily according to literary rules and, if so, what are they? What is

the significant difference between literary and figurative speech in history and how does

it create historical meaning? How do we distinguish the historical referent of a discourse

and its constructed, i.e., its ideological, meaning? Can history ever exist beyond

discourse? And the very big question, is history what happened, or what historians tell us

happened? All these have to be addressed when we do history, to ignore them is to do

only half the job (ibid.).

I find the suspicion raised by postmodern historians useful in my own research.

Equally important, however, is to acknowledge that the discipline of history is a

necessary fiction of the historian. This, then, invites a simultaneous suspicion and

51
seduction of historical knowledge and methods. As such, while it may seem desirable for

the postmodern historian to trouble concepts such as truth, accuracy and objectivity, I

must also acknowledge that they are a part of my research and I cannot entirely do

without such concepts at present. As Spivak reveals, we must think about the things we

cannot think without. Thus, a destabilizing of grand narratives is potentially constructive

in any historical project. Petra Munro contributes to the debate by maintaining that we

must become comfortable with a more complex, less tidy, non-linear understandings of

history that disrupt the very categories that make history intelligible. It is Munro’s site of

“dis-ease,” doing history while simultaneously being suspicious of it, that I find useful to

embrace. Similarly, Hayden White (1978) tells us that

The historian serves no one well by constructing a specious continuity

between the present world and that which precedes it. On the contrary, we
require a history that will educate us to discontinuity more than ever
before; for discontinuity, disruption and chaos are our lot (p. 50).

How, then, does this debate translate into a discussion of school history?

School History versus Other Kinds of History

The distinguishing feature of school history in contemporary societies from other

kinds of history is its highly institutionalized form, a characteristic reflecting the

centralized control of nation-states over educational content, methods and objectives

(Maternicki, 1995). Furthermore, history in Europe has often been employed in the

constructing of national identities with history education programs aiming to foster these

identities through a national sense of the past (van der Leeuw-Roord, 2001). Historian Efi

Avdela describes history courses, particularly in Europe, as playing a central role in the

52
process of cultivating a national identity. According to her, the goal is to provide a

common past, a common myth of origin and promote cultural homogeneity within a

nation-state’s population (Avdela, 2001, p. 239). Avdela states that the type of school

history that promotes the cultivation of national identity is currently in place in Greece.

[T]he nation-state considers it necessary for students to learn about those

historical events that are believed to cultivate love of country…and
knowledge of the past is subordinated to…an agenda that is explicitly
didactic in the sense that its goal is to make sure students draw the
“proper” conclusions from history (Avdela, 2001, p. 241).

As a result, a single point of view is imposed on students. This implies an agenda that

lies outside the sphere of historical knowledge. However, Christina Koulouri (2002), in

the introduction to Clio in the Balkans: The Politics of History Education, describes a

very different goal for school history—to promote mutual tolerance and understanding.

Koulouri (2002) envisions a school history in the Balkans that considers “new trends in

academic history” (p. 34), i.e., postmodern approaches for school history.

The new educational approach to Balkan history is summarized in the

application of a comparative, multiperspective method, the focus on
economic, social and cultural history and the development of students’
analytical and interpretive skills to enable them to evaluate the information
they receive (Koulouri, 2002, p. 34).

She goes on to describe that comparative school history aims to acquaint students

with both differences and similarities in an attempt to abolish the dogmatic teaching

objective of history that promotes a single truth. Equally, the move away from military

and political history and toward economic, social and cultural history is meant to engage

students in discussions of historical experiences that are more interesting and relevant for

them. It also aims at teaching conflicts from a new perspective by deemphasizing war as

an element of historical evolution, especially in terms of relations with neighboring

53
states. Finally, and perhaps most important, the development of critical thinking is the

main purpose of her vision of historical teaching and learning, in the hope that future

citizens will be more informed decision makers (Koulouri, 2002). While Avdela and

Koulouri describe two very different ways of viewing school history, one observed and

the other a vision, both describe ways that school history may be designed and for what

purpose.

According to historian Efi Evdela’s studies of history teaching in Greece today,

the curriculum is designed as a highly centralized system with a standardized history

textbook for each grade level. These textbooks, according to Avdela et al, present the

Greek nation as an almost ‘natural’ entity, having three main traits: uninterrupted

historical continuity since antiquity, the powerful ability of conserving Greek cultural

characteristics, and great cultural homogeneity (Avdela, 1997; 2000). Thus, these history

courses play a diffuse yet omnipotent role in the process of constructing national identity.

Specifically, the purpose is to devise a national discourse that constructs a common past

and common national narrative; cultural features that, together with language and

territory, are considered the distinguishing features of any national identity (Evdela,

2000; Jusdanis, 2001; Danforth, 1995). In other words, historian “in the context of a

Greek educational system that is highly centralized, uniform, and ethnocentric, the main

purpose of history teaching appears to be the development of national consciousness [i.e.

identity] rather than the cultivation of critical thinking” (Avdela, 2000, p. 235). By

teaching the past in this way, the Greek educational system is reproducing a romantic

conception of the nation-state. The way in which this conception influences the

formulation and transmission of knowledge in schools varies significantly from country

54
to country and, according to Avdela, the Greek educational system is a good illustration

of a school system that attaches particular significance to its account of national history

(2000). She poignantly states,

The Greek educational system attaches particular significance to national

history. The continuity of Hellenism from antiquity to the present
constitutes an essential component of Greek national identity and is
continuously reproduced in school through the teaching of history and
other courses and activities…In the national narrative reproduced in
school, the Greek nation is understood as a natural, unified, eternal, and
unchanging entity, not a product of history. The teaching of history
neither moves beyond this ethnocentric concept of the nation nor
familiarizes students with the production of historical knowledge (Avdela,
2000, p. 239).

The analysis chapters of my research project take up this discussion in a

comparison of the national and non-national history curricula offered at the school under

study. However, before getting to the analysis of data from this case study, it is

constructive to explore the current condition through an historical account of education in

Europe, the European Union and Greece during the last three decades. By doing so, one

may better understand from where educational ideas originated, by whom and for what

explicit purposes.

55
 CHAPTER 3

EDUCATION IN EUROPE: REFLECTIONS ON THE LAST THREE

DECADES

A united Europe presents critical challenges for the future. European

communities of today, especially their big cities, are increasingly pursuing transnational

partnerships and globally minded political sensibilities (Dragonas, 2000). Such flows of

people, information, knowledge and culture, whether deliberate or unintentional, reflect

trends associated with discourses of transnationalism. Central to this is the tension

between global and local forces, as distinctively manifested within organizations,

institutions, and cultures. Also notable is the challenges they pose to the centrality of

nationalism and identity in cultural processes and studies (Comaroff, 1996; Hannerz,

1997; Kearney, 1995; Appadurai, 2000). Thus, attention to the significance of

educational processes, traditionally represented through institutions wherein nationalism

and cultural identity are produced and reinforced, is a compelling area of research. While

the preceding chapter progresses from a general discussion of the discourses associated

with nationalism, the European space and history education, the current one transitions to

a requisite awareness of these discourses in considering the development of a European

dimension in education, what legitimates support for and resistance to the

56
Europeanization of education and the specific context of Greek national education reform

as it compares to the multinational European agenda.

DEVELOPING A EUROPEAN DIMESION IN EDUCATION

An imagined community such as the European Union is invisible and must be

represented before it can be experienced and loved, or hated (Dragonas, 2001, p. 344).

This process of making the European Union visible is achieved, in part, through

education. The European space, with its purposeful efforts to reshape cultural borders

through such directives as found in the Europeanization of education process, provides an

interesting springboard for discussing the discourses associated with defining Europe.

Likewise, the continually evolving process of European integration creates new

challenges for the national educational systems within it. Thus, attention is directed to

pan-European influences in the process of education and unification. Particularly, the

involvement of the two most important pan-European organizations, the European Union

and the Council of Europe, is discussed in this review.

Early attempts at European unity tend to focus on the conquests and influence

exercised by a few powerful states (Tulasiewicz & Brock, 2000). The unity imposed,

such as that by the Roman and Ottoman Empires, by the Church, or with the Nazi regime,

usually sparked uprisings in those parts of Europe who were excluded from the powerful

centers of control or living under oppressive conditions. After the Second World War,

new attempts to unify the European space emerged. These new plans are presented as

peaceful means for including a wider marshalling of humanitarian, health and educational

concerns (p. 11). The Council of Europe has suggested the idea of unity in diversity,

57
emphasizing the advantages of both unity and diversity, as a policy for the European

Union. Thus, creating an intercultural process by exploiting the multicultural character of

Europe in education initiatives recognizes that European unity is not so much the result of

a common legacy, which is a static element, but that it is dynamic agreed-upon actions

that are the catalyst to future developments (Gundara, 1996).

The form of European education accepted in principle by all member states,

formerly known as “Europeanization of education,” is known today as the European

dimension. The idea, originally proposed in 1988 by the European Commission of the

European Union, envisions young Europeans developing “a spirit of European

collaboration and comradeship which may include European competitiveness in

contradistinction to the predominant cultivation of national ‘one-upmanship’” (p. 18). As

Raymond Ryba points out, these efforts are not new and there is a long history of efforts

to Europeanize national education systems. He cites figures such as Comenius (1592-

1670), Voltaire (1694-1778), Adam Smith (1723-1790), Victor Hugo (1802-1885) and

Aristide Briand (1862-1932) as believers in a fundamental unity of European culture that

was shared, despite the constant wars, and which, if only developed and made explicit,

could lead to greater peace (Ryba, 2000, p. 246). However, little progress was made in

this direction as nationalist projects, particularly in the nineteenth and early twentieth

centuries, developed nationalist curricula, which led to centrifugal rather than centripetal

tendencies in the evolution of European education. It was only after World War II that

organizations such as the Council of Europe and the then European Economic

Community, from which the European Union developed, initiated and began to expand

upon educational directives (p. 246).

58
The Council of Europe

Of the two, the Council of Europe, founded in 1949 and based in Strasbourg, is

the oldest and less powerful organization. As Article I of the Statute of the Council of

Europe states, “The aim of the Council of Europe is to achieve a greater unity between its

members…” (www.coe.int). At the same time, it involves far more European countries

in its membership than does the European Union, including forty-six member states

encompassing 800 million Europeans as of January 2005. Since November 1990, the

accession of 21 countries of central and eastern Europe, the most recent being Serbia and

Montenegro in April 2003, has given the Council “a genuine pan-European dimension, so

that it is now the organization that represents Greater Europe” (www.coe.int). Likewise,

the Vienna Summit in October 1993 cast the Council of Europe as “the guardian of

democratic security” founded on human rights, democracy and the rule of law. And

during the Second Summit in Strasbourg in October 1997, the Heads of State adopted a

plan to strengthen the Council’s work in four areas: democracy and human rights, social

cohesion, the security of citizens and democratic values, and cultural diversity

(www.coe.int).

As a body founded to encourage cultural cooperation, it has always seen the

development of cooperation in education as one of its major responsibilities. Two

questions posed on the Council of Europe official website demonstrate their commitment.

How can education promote human rights and fundamental freedoms and strengthen

pluralist democracy? and How can education unite Europe’s peoples and bring mutual

understanding and confidence across cultural divides and national borders? (ibid.).

Having always shared its educational and cultural objectives with all states in Europe,

59
regardless of membership in the organization, it may be viewed as one of the most

important organizing bodies related to education in Europe. Thus, an underlying

assumption that may be present for the organization is that education is ideologically

equivalent to culture in this European Union government organization. However, the

Council of Europe has no legislative powers. This means that its influence is limited to

generating discussions, exhortations, and publications only.

The European Union

The European Union is a very different organization. Although it is more

powerful than the Council of Europe, having clear legislative powers over and above

those of its member states in some domains, it is limited to a much smaller number of

European countries. The first organizations to emerge in Europe after WWII were aimed

at strengthening economic ties among the different countries. The Schuman Plan for

establishing a European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), put forth in 1951, actually

preceded the EEC. The Treaties of Rome, subsequently, established the EEC, whose

purpose was to integrate the members’ economic resources other than coal and steel into

an economic union within which goods, labor, services and capital would move freely.

These two organizations, along with the European Atomic Energy Community, merged

into the “European Community” in 1967. The original six members of these

organizations are Belgium, Federal Republic of Germany, France, Italy, Luxembourg,

and The Netherlands. As of May 2004, the European Union includes twenty-five

members. These are, in addition to the original six, Austria, Cyprus, Czech Republic,

Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland,

60
Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Four additional

countries, Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania and Turkey, hold candidate status15

(www.europa.eu.int).

The European Union’s central purposes, until recently, have been essentially

economic and political, rather than cultural and educational. Legislation is overseen by

its Council of Ministers, a body of ministers from member states relevant to the particular

issues. Decisions made by the Council of Ministers are administered and carried out by

the European Commission, headquartered in Brussels. While the Council of Europe

sponsored studies aimed at promoting a more European, less nationalistic attitude in

school curricula as early as the 1950s, including studies on bias in textbooks and

international student exchanges, the European Economic Community played absolutely

no part in educational matters until the 1970s (Neave, 1984). In the early years of the

European community, education was seen as the sole responsibility of national

governments. However, the ministers of education, the most relevant Council of

Ministers meetings for educational issues, began convening regularly in the 1970s, and in

1976 the European Community set up its first set of educational programs directly aimed

at the development of a European “dimension” of education (CEC, 1976). At this time,

the term European dimension of education has replaced older terms such as

15
A candidate country is one that has applied to join the European Union and whose application has been
officially accepted. Before a candidate country can join the EU it must meet the Copenhagen criteria.
First, it must have stable institutions guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law, human rights and respect for
minorities. Second, it must have a functioning market economy. Third, it must take on board all the EU
treaties and laws, declarations and resolutions, international agreements on EU affairs and the judgments
given by the Court of Justice, and support the various aims of the European Union. The EU reserves the
right to decide when a candidate country has met these criteria and when the EU is ready to accept the new
member.
61
Europeanization, because it is believed to be more representative of the goals of the

European Community (Ryle, 2000, p. 251).

Outcomes of a Europeanization of Education

By the 1980s, two developments occurred that were significant for a European

dimension of education. The first was the development of exchange programs, including

the Erasmus program for inter-university exchanges. This program proved to be a

successful ways of stimulating higher education cooperation across national borders

(Ryle, 2000; Brock & Tulasiewicz, 2000; Winther-Jensen, 1996).16 Around the same

time, the Lingua and Tempus programs were established. The former supports interest in

improved competence in European languages and the latter, set up after the fall of the

Iron Curtain, promotes research and exchange activities between Central and Eastern

European states (Ryba, 2000; Bucur & Eklof, 1999). While these initiatives were indirect

and limited ways of promoting appreciation and understanding among students, the

second development, more direct in nature, aimed at teaching a European dimension in

schools through revised curricula and teacher training (Ryle, 2000). This led to the

passing of the European Community Council Resolution in May 1988, which set general

objectives for all member states to follow in implementing a European dimension in the

curricula and teacher education programs. Briefly, this included the “strengthening in

young people a sense of European identity,” “young people’s preparation for

participation in the European Union,” “awareness of the advantages and challenges the

16
Additional exchange programs include the Arion Program, concerned with supporting study visits by
education specialists, the Commett Program, which promoted cooperation between higher education and
industry in the area of technology, and Youth for Europe, a program supporting exchanges in non-formal
education (CEC, 1989).
62
community represents,” and “improved knowledge of all member states’ historical,

cultural, economic, and social aspects” (CEC, 1988).

After this time, the ministers of education began more regular meetings. This was

due, in part, to the Council Resolution, and, in part, to the acceptance of the Maastricht

Treaty in 199217, wherein the first direct article referring to education appeared. Since

this time, the European Union has become more involved in educational matters. The

article, Article 126, begins by stating that,

The Community shall contribute to the development of quality education

by encouraging cooperation between Member States and, if necessary, by
supporting and supplementing their action, while fully respecting the
responsibility of the Member States for the content of teaching and the
organization of educational systems and their cultural and linguistic
diversity (CEC, 1992).

A related article in the Maastricht Treaty, Article 3b, ensures that educational

decisions remain heavily within the domain of the individual member states, though.

This principle, known as the subsidiarity principle, makes it clear that national

educational systems are protected from supranational decisions in educational matters

and thus, decisions to implement initiatives remain at the local level (Ryba, 2000). The

treaty also led to increased budgets for education and training activities. Subsequently,

all former education programs were regrouped under one of two main program headings:

Socrates or Leonardo da Vinci. Broadly speaking, the Socrates Program brings together

all programs in the education field and the Leonardo Program consolidates all training

initiatives. Socrates, today in its second phase, states as its objective the promotion of a

“Europe of knowledge” and the encouragement of “lifelong education” through learning

17
With the signing of the Maastricht Treaty in 1992, the European Community was officially transformed
into the European Union.
63
foreign languages, encouraging mobility, promoting cooperation at the European level,

opening access to education and increasing the use of new technologies in the field of

education. The major programs included in Socrates II are Comenius and Erasmus,

exchange programs for primary/secondary and university level students respectively,

Lingua, for language learning, Minerva, for information and communication technologies

in education, and Grudtvig, for facilitating the integration of adults formerly excluded

from the school system. The Leonardo da Vinci program focuses on vocational eduction.

Today, the shift from ideological standards to the development of concrete

examples of successful European dimension objectives and the creation of specific

teaching materials for use in secondary school curricula is on the rise. For example, the

European Union publishes a continuing series of monographs of successful case studies

in developing the European dimension and has created a series of fourteen major teaching

units for use in all schools within the European Union. Subjects include Environmental

Damage in Europe, The Industrial Revolution: Birth of a European Technological Space,

The Rights of Man in Europe, Greek Drama and its Influences on European Theatre,

Literature and Ideas, Conflict in Europe, Identity, Solidarity and the Development of a

New Europe, and A European Economic Database.

It is clear that in the last fifty years, a growing interest and seriousness in

establishing a meaningful level of Europeanization in education is present. Both

productive and dangerous prospects may be found in the European dimension process. In

the next section, I consider challenges that are likely to be a part of this process in order

to expose and assess guiding assumptions manifest in a European dimension of education

project.

64
PROBLEMATIZING ASSUMPTIONS

The 1988 European Community Council Resolution is generally recognized as the

strongest stimulus to the whole range of educational activities taking place in Europe

(Tulasiewicz & Brock, 2000, p. 32). In addition, organizations such as Eurydice, the

information network on education in Europe, publish comparative studies and indicators

on the functioning of education systems at all educational levels (www.eurydice.org).

Thus, beginning with the concept of a unified European space, realized in the European

Union, contributions have been made to the changing role of education therein. From

these transformations, there are productive aspects in the implementation of a European

dimension in education. For example, one intention of the project is to overcome

ethnocentrism in Europe (Luchtenberg, 1996; Lisbon European Council, March 2000).

Additionally, current progress has inspired a multitude of research projects and pilot

projects aimed at studying issues related to the European space. At the same time,

exposing assumptions in the project of European integration may lead to strategies that

are likely to be required for continued success of a European dimension of education.

The Rhetoric of Inclusiveness

One assumption, an issue discussed earlier, rests in the very meaning of

“European.” When the European Union refers to the development of a European

identity, it is uncertain whether this includes only European cultures, only dominant

cultures or whether the reference to cultural diversity in Europe includes those students

from non-European cultures. In other words, Is the European dimension a Eurocentric

limitation to Europeans of non-European descent or does it refer to the cultural diversity

65
of Europe which is also very much influenced by non-European cultures? Furthermore,

does a European dimension include the relationship between youth living in Europe as

well as those outside the European Union and outside the European space overall? One

concrete way to examine this assumption is to look at language programs in member

states’ schools. To date, there is still a clear distinction between “official” languages of

the EU and minority languages, which like dialects, do not enjoy the same status as

official ones. While the Barcelona European Council (2002) recommended that at least

two foreign languages be learned from a very early age, the dominance of English is

clearly apparent, followed by French, German, Spanish and Russian. Together, these five

languages account for 95% of foreign language learning within the European Union

(Wastiau-Schlüter, 2005). Thus, while the Lingua program expands language instruction,

it is still assumed that only “official” languages are useful to study. Thus, all programs

developed under the auspices of the European dimension of education, beginning with

the projects under the Socrates and Leonardo programs, must be designed to consciously

reflect more than an assimilationist project.

Assuming Positive Outcomes

Another dangerous assumption is situated in the project’s outcomes. After

reading the literature, it appears that positive outcomes are assumed rather than

established. For example, exchange programs such as Erasmus have clearly increased the

number of university students traveling between countries for educational opportunities.

However, this still involves only a minority of students and of those who do travel, not

much is known, at least in the literature thus far, about the effects of this kind of activity

66
on the attitudes of students. In fact, Ryba (2000) reports that very little research has been

done at the level of schools to begin to understand whether exchange programs in Europe

are doing what they are meant to do. Issues of funding and movement are central here,

too. Because it is expensive not only for individual nation-states to support exchange

programs, although EU Member States receive ample funding, but also for individuals

participating in them, opportunities are severely limited. Similarly, what is the flow of

students into countries? Are students only traveling to northern and western countries in

Europe or are they encouraged to travel to the less industrialized zones as well? This

issue calls for more understanding of the effects of EU projects at the local level and

outside dominant nation-states. Thus, strategies to increase in-depth research at various

types of schools in order to assess the implementation and outcomes of the

Europeanization of education are of great potential. My last two points further

emphasizes this claim.

It appears that the best chance of introducing a European dimension more widely

is through the school curricula. This way, the largest number of students and teachers are

involved. However, in developing curricular materials at the supranational level, the

assumption is that curricular content, ideas, values and attitudes will travel unchanged

across cultural border. However, as dialectical processes of global and local movements

demonstrate, meaning does not necessarily remain constant. This is not to suggest that

such processes are negative. Indeed, local interpretations of transnational tropes make

such passages possible. Thus, the impact of globalization provides a challenge for

understanding the changing contexts of education and its relation to the European Union,

cultural and ethnic groups and individuals. As people become increasingly aware that the

67
constraints of geography on social and cultural arrangements are receding (Morrow &

Torres, 1999, p. 105), there simultaneously arises the need to recognize local responses to

transnational agendas. Thus, I turn to the case of Greece in order to discuss educational

reform in a local setting. In doing so, I broadly sketch the course of educational reform

movements during the last three decades, the time in which a Europeanization of

education was also being developed. The main argument arising from this section is that

contradiction is a vibrant part of any attempt to describe identity, thus it is meaningful to

include it in any conception of a common European identity.

THREE DECADES OF EDUCATION REFORM IN GREECE

Writing about a nepotism scandal involving a Greek politician who helped his

daughter secure a transfer to Thessaloniki from a provincial university, one journalist

tells his readers, “studying our backward modern education system, any informed

educator stands grinning on familiar ground. «Bread- Education-Freedom» has been a

slogan since the 1960s-'70s. However, at the present time, Greece is a rich country on a

low-calorie diet” (Payiatakis, 2004). Historically, the Greek system of education has

been highly centralized and decisions on all educational matters come from the top. The

national curriculum of both primary and secondary levels, including curricula in private

high schools, is prescribed in detail by the government through the agency known as the

Greek Pedagogical Institute. Moreover, the Ministry of Education and Religious Affairs,

primarily dictates the governance of the schools (Flouris & Pasias, 2003). Over the last

forty years, the Ministry in association with each political party in power has enacted six

major comprehensive reforms. This means that on average, excluding the seven-year

68
period of the military dictatorship (1967–1974), reform of the Greek education system

seems to be taking place every six years, an impressive record by international standards.

Yet this phenomenon becomes less impressive when some of its more qualitative aspects

of reforms in Greece are taken into consideration (Mattheou, 2003). In other words, to

understand the current role of pre-tertiary education in Greek society today, it is

productive to outline, albeit partially, education reform during three historical periods in

the development of the nation-state. As numerous sources indicate, and Kazamias and

Roussakis (2003) succinctly summarize, “…the modern Greek educational system and

modern Greek paideia have been constructed and developed in relation to the formation

and continued process of consolidation and modernization of the Greek nation-state” (p.

8). Thus, after the fall of the Ottoman Empire, the Greek educational system was

constituted and developed in tandem with the Greek nation-state in the nineteenth century

as an instrument for molding a national identity (ibid.). By the end of the nineteenth

century, Greece had developed into a constitutional monarchy with a representative

parliamentary government, yet its educational institutions remained mechanisms for

nation-building, national cohesion and the development and construction of national

identity.

The focus in this section is on reforms in the last three decades of the contemporary

era, specifically aligning with that of the post-junta period in Greece. I have chosen the

decade of the 1980s as a starting point as it is during this time that two major political

events, both having a great impact on Greek society, came into being. In 1981 the

country joined the European Economic Community, now the European Union, as a full

member state. At the same time, the Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK), the

69
political party in power for approximately nineteen out of the last twenty-four years

(1981-1990, 1993-2004) first came into power. From these two important political

developments, I discuss the impact that each, PASOK and the European Union, have had

on educational policy during these decades of reform in Greece.

The Decade of the 1980s: PASOK and Third Way Socialist Reform

The first PASOK administration of the 1980s may be described as a socialist

government under Prime Minister Andreas Panandreou. Although the PASOK party was

not elected into power until 1981, it set clear objectives for education in its 1977

campaign that were quickly abandoned in the 1980s, alluding to the party’s reform

orientation described below. With the political slogan “Change” in 1977, PASOK sought

a new course for Greek society, a society endorsing national independence, popular

sovereignty and social emancipation (Grollios and Kaskaris, 2003). However, the

abandonment of three key features of education reform attests to PASOK’s support for

the perpetuation of an anachronistic educational system based on over-centralization and

authoritarianism. First, former claims to finance education with 15% of the national

budget were abandoned in the 1980s. Second, ideas found in their 1977 program relating

to a pedagogy that would not accustom children to obedience, firm hierarchies,

authoritative administration and uncritical discipline were diminished. Third, the

possibility to use multiple textbooks for the teaching of one subject, thus allowing

teaching and learning to become more critical and evaluative, was completely abolished

in the 1980s (Grollios and Kaskaris, 2003).

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 In their 1981 political campaign, while continuing to embrace the idea of change

through socialization, concurrently adopted the new political slogan, “Contract with the

People.” PASOK’s program for education, released just before the 1981 elections, states:

As for education, which is a national endeavour and fundamental for the

course of the Nation in history, nothing can suffice. Education, that is the
whole of the spiritual undertaking of the People, contains the spiritual
conquests made throughout the historical progress of the Nation. For us
[PASOK] education is the very foundation of Change (PASOK, 1981, p.
49).

From this, it is clear that the educational discourse in the 1980s continues to

define education with reference to the concept of the nation, a far cry from a new course

for improving an ailing educational system. However, official documents explicitly

frame educational reform mainly around the concepts of democratization, egalitarianism

and expansion of the educational enterprise (Kazamias & Roussakis, 2003). The reform

orientation was, according to Prime Minister Papandreou, consistent with the broader

vision of a “third way” socialism, a participatory and democratic socialism (Giddens,

1998; Kazamias & Roussakis, 2003) . One of the more substantial of the perceived “third

way” initiatives relating to upper secondary education was the establishment of the

“comprehensive multilateral lyceum” (EPL) in 1985. In the Law Plan, it was declared:

The comprehensive multilateral school ensures the organic linking of

general with technical-vocational education and provides opportunities to
all students for the “balanced” development of their abilities and the
cultivation of their interests and aptitudes so that they will be able to
participate in production and in the development of the country (OLME,
1985, p. 7).

This was certainly an attempt to put general and technical-vocational education on

level ground. In reality, however, PASOK’s reform program in the 1980s did not

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measure up. Overall, the changes are characteristic of PASOK’s education reform goals

which seemed to stress centralization over quality.

The Decade of the 1990s: The Return of PASOK and EREFORM 2000

The return of the PASOK party in 1993, but especially after the death of Andreas

Papandreou and the election of Costas Simitis as prime minister in 1996, marked a new

orientation towards social democracy and an even stronger pro-European course for

Greece. In the rhetoric of education reform, the party sought to align education with

economic and social developments in the European space in the 1990s, a noticeably new

educational ideology for Greece (Kazamias & Roussakis, 2003; Zambeta ,2000), and

with economist Gerasimos Arsenis as Minister of Education and Religious Affairs, such

orientation is not surprising. Consequently, in the summer of 1997 Parliament voted in

favor of PASOK’s Education Act 2525/1997, of which the document EREFORM 2000

was produced (Grollios & Kaskaris, 2003). As the Greek constitution provides for free

education for all Greek citizens at all educational levels, it was argued that the public

expenditures on education were not enough to ensure quality in education. Thus, it

became clear that Greek education was not free at all. In other words, high private

expenditures were spent on education as a compensation for the inadequacies of the

public sector. Most of these private expenses went towards expensive supplementary

courses, known as frontisteria, or cram schools, and the cost of university students

studying abroad (Zambeta, 2000). These private education expenditures were used as a

major argument to support the creation of EREFORM 2000 in 1997 (Kazamias &

Zambeta, 2000). Minister Arsenis is reported to have said:

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 We have an educational system difficult to be described, a system that
needs to be changed. It is based on public educational provisions. Parallel
to this system another strong system has grown that purport to cover the
inadequacies of the formal sector. We are spending tremendous amounts
of money on education, either from public or private resources, without
having the desirable education outcome. (Stangos, 1998, in Zambeta,
2000, p. 4).

EREFORM 2000, as evaluated by Kazamias and Roussakis (2003), reveals the

acknowledgement of an educational crisis in Greece near the close of the twentieth

century. Their work indicates that the educational crisis was perceived to be one of (a)

the persistence of chronic system pathologies, including inequalities of opportunities

between rural and urban areas, high dropout rates, frontisteria (cram schools),

authoritarian pedagogy, anachronistic educational knowledge, a double educational

network (general and vocational) that functioned differentially for social groups, and a

highly bureaucratic, hierarchical system and (b) an “asynchronization” of the Greek

educational system relative to the new European and global world that was being

constructed and in which Greece chose to place itself (p. 17). Examples of the latter

include a mismatch between employment and education, an increase in Greeks studying

abroad, and the large number of public sector employees in Greece compared to other EU

countries.

Relevant to pre-tertiary education, EREFORM 2000 created the unified lyceum

(eniaio lykeio) to replace the comprehensive multilateral lyceum (EPL), and this was

considered by many to be the key ingredient for a much-needed update in educational

design for Greece. “According to one of the prime reform actors, the eniaio lykeio was

seen as a modern type of school that was prevalent in Europe and the world” (Kazamias

& Roussakis, 2003, p. 18). According to Law 2525/1997, the new upper secondary

73
school would follow the three-year compulsory general gymnasium (gymnasio) and

consist of three directions: theoretical, positive/scientific, and technological (Flouris &

Pasias, 2003). Graduates would be awarded the National School-Leaving Certificate

(similar to the French baccalaureate), which would entitle recipients to enter university or

vocational schools. However, compulsory education remained at nine years, making the

unified lyceum an option rather than a requirement for Greek students.

The institution of the unified lyceum was believed to be the way “to respond to

the demands of equal opportunities for education, to the reduction of the differentiating

lines among the various school types/forms in existence, and to the more efficient

development of the abilities, aptitudes, and interests of students.” At the same time, it

was seen as a school that would provide “a solid foundation of general education”

(Exarchakos, 1997, pp. 28-29, in Kazamias & Roussakis, 2003). As discussed in the

following section, while a degree of their goals have been achieved, the majority of

reform efforts of EREFORM 2000 have yet to be realized. Educational discourses in

Greece continue to place emphasis on social inclusion. “This policy present egalitarian

objectives; it gives an impression of further democratization of the education system and

of loosening the selective character of education” (Zambeta, 2000, p. 8). An intense

system of student examinations in the last two years of lyceum leads to school failure and

drop outs. In tandem are the high private expenditures for supplementary courses

(frontisteria) that prepare the student for these examinations. Equally, the introduction of

an entrepreneurial culture in education emphasizes skills that develop employability

rather than general knowledge that develops a broad range of understandings. In fact

these forms of education may be in danger of leading to social exclusion in Greece.

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Thus, what is there to disclose about the last, and most recent, wave of educational

reform in Greece?

New Century: New Democracy for Education

According to recent study Greece is last among education indices in the European

Union (Anagnostopoulos, 2004). “Greece has yet to establish as system for equipping

young people to respond to the challenges and needs of the globalization era, officials

say. Nor does the existing system provide a solid general education” (ibid.). To address

the problem, the current Ministry of Education and Religion has chosen the Finnish

system, which has enjoyed great success in implementation, as a working model for its

own reforms. The appeal of the Finnish system for today’s Ministry is that it provides

both a general foundation of knowledge and the specific professional skills needed to

compete in the marketplace. This appeal demonstrates the direction of education in

Greece under the neo-conservative New Democracy Party (2004-present), not veering too

far from its predecessors, and it is realized in the imminent reforms announced in March

2004 by the New Democracy Education Minister, Marietta Giannakou. The following

highlights some of the proposals as they relate to pre-tertiary education.

With respect to Panhellenic examinations, they will be abolished and transformed

into internal school assessment exams in B’ Lyceum (second year of three in lyceum)

during the 2004-2005 academic year. In the following academic year, 2005-2006,

students in C’ Lyceum (final year of lyceum) will be examined in six, rather than nine,

subjects in order to be admitted to university (Anotera Ekpedeftika Idrymata) and

technical colleges (Technologika Ekpedeftika Idrymata). Next, changes to the structure

75
of the lyceum are proposed, again, wherein two main types are established: the General

Lyceum and the Vocational Lyceum. The Technical Vocational Schools are to be

abolished and substituted by Vocational Lyceums, thus, upgrading vocational education

to the lyceum level. The final and perhaps most significant proposal in the new reform is

to extend compulsory education from nine to twelve years, thus making mandatory six

years of demotiko (primary school), three years of gymnasio (junior high school) and

three years of lykeio (lyceum or high school). Greece needs to adopt an effective system

of educational administration and control, the ministry says. At the same time, the

government plans to introduce changes gradually to make the transition process less

disruptive.

Forces that Bind

These new reform efforts reflect the sisyphian struggles that have plagued Greek

education since the early formation of the nation-state, struggles that are caused by forces

that have limited the possibility for system change. Particularly for Greece, two of the

most significant forces have been history and culture. Historically, after four hundred

years of struggle against the Ottoman yoke the establishment of the modern Greek

nation-state led to a profoundly embedded suspicion for authority, especially in the form

of local management (Persianis, 2003; Gourgouris, 1992). Thus, a highly centralized

education system was used to “forge a unitary and homogeneous state that would permit

very little regional difference” (Economou, 1993, in Persianis, 2003, p. 50). In other

words, education was used to ensure “a specific type of national identity and the

transferring of orientations, loyalties, and bonds from the local or regional level to the

76
national center” (Mouzelis, 1992, in Persianis, 2003, pp. 50-51). Over time, it has been

proven quite difficult to break from this fixed educational structure and purpose.

History can also explain the low regard the state showed its citizens for a very

long time (Persianis, 2003). The long enslavement of the Greeks led to a poorly educated

citizenry and this sizeable portion of society grew to mistrust the small educated populace

and vice versa. This mistrust persists today as noted in the 1995 OECD Review that there

is “a distressing lack of trust at many levels of the [educational] system. Thus students

argue that more rigorous and regular assessment would make them subject to the political

bias of their teachers. Teachers argue that to do away with the waiting list [for job

placement], based on seniority, would make teacher appointments forfeit to the clientele

system” (OECE, 1995, p.4). The report goes on to point out that this mistrust is a serious

hindrance to educational change.

Culturally, the most influential force impeding educational change in Greece is

the Greek Orthodox religion. As stated in numerous sources, the Greek cultural

traditions of history, language, literature and religion have been the basic constituents of

Greek national identity (Dragonas & Frangoudaki et al., 2000). This is reflected in the

traditional ideal to foster good Greeks and good Christians and the government’s

insistence that religion remain a compulsory subject in all public schools despite

proposals to make such a curricular change (Persianis, 2003). The Orthodox Church’s

influence is also made explicit on the first day of school every year when the agiasmos,

blessing, is performed. This is a Greek tradition that speaks to the presence of Greek

Orthodoxy in the schools. During the agiasmos, mandated by the state, a Greek

Orthodox priest performs a ceremony to bless the school, students, faculty and staff.

77
Students take part in official ceremony regardless of religious affiliation or belief.

Similar agiasmos ceremonies are performed during school celebrations, such as OXI Day

and Independence Day, both national holidays. Similarly, all classrooms are adorned

with a religious icon of the Virgin and Child and in many cases, this is the only

adornment on the walls. When asked to make religious instruction an optional subject in

schools, the Ministry of Education has steadfastly rejected all proposals. It is believed to

be an essential subject for all Greek citizens, including religious minorities, despite

suggestions that it is a breach of students’ civil rights. This position is more explicable in

light of the fact that the Ministry of Education, officially named the “Ministry of

Education and Religious Affairs,” oversees both educational and religious affairs.

However, this is not to suggest that the influence of the Orthodox Church in educational

matters is acceptable for a multicultural, multireligious, multiethnic Greek society.

Conversely, it is another key obstacle to changing a system that is out of sync with

contemporary needs and demands.

I close with a commentary written in response to New Democracy’s most recent

education reforms as discussed above. It reflects the anxiety, immediacy and relevance

Greeks continue to attach to education as a means of achieving social stability and

personal development, despite its mediocre past.

Our concern should not be confined to policies such as compulsory 12-year

education or regular school examinations, however useful these measures
may be. The pending debate must produce a long-term and daring program
for education reform, starting with the oft-neglected primary education.
Greece has a lot to learn from Scandinavian countries, where the improving
performance of the school system over the previous years is said to be the
result of considerable, long-term investment in staff and equipment, both in
primary and higher schools. The government should reform education along
Scandinavian lines and build a quality system — and not one geared to the

78
lowest common denominator. For this to happen, education reformers must
look beyond the examination system and the number of entrants and instead
promote truly long-term investment in accordance with a program that will be
followed for a decade without interruptions and knee-jerk reactions.
(“Education Reform,” 2004).

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 CHAPTER 4

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

DEFINING THE PROJECT

The purpose of this study is to explore, utilizing the tools of educational

ethnography and mixed methods research, the relationship between historical

consciousness and cultural identity by means of a case study approach. Threaded into the

methodological discussion is the assumption that educational researchers who invest an

interest in culture are caught between the proverbial rock and a hard place. On one hand,

we strive to listen to and represent those people and institutions we study from a

perspective that is their own. On the other hand, we recognize that our role in shaping

the ethnographic experience is not invisible but influential. We make sense of what we

experience from our own epistemological and cultural frameworks and experiences. The

potential always exists that we will envelop our participants’ voices and experiences

within our own views and interests. Rather than adopting a nihilist attitude, I believe that

researchers must name the tensions that exist and use them as productive sites for

avoiding misunderstandings and misrepresentations. In other words, I am interested in

making the contradictions visible in productive ways so that the positive and negative

(and other) effects on the lives of individuals may be imagined. Instead of being weighted

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down by seemingly endless stuck places in research, this project has given me the

opportunity to develop new ways of imagining relationships that are continually

evolving. This idea of continually evolving knowledge and shifting understandings has

evolved as the general methodological goal of my own research and is exemplified

throughout the ensuing discussion.

In the following sections, I delineate my choice to pursue an ethnographic case

study approach. Specifically, I identity the research design, explicit purposes that

underlie it, pose a set of research questions and discuss framing epistemologies. Then, I

outline the methodological approaches utilized in the study and discuss central

procedures and issues related to methods of data collection and analysis. In the final

section, I discuss the advantages and challenges encountered during the research process,

including trustworthiness, interpretation and representation and language issues.

Research Design

My doctoral research began in August 2002 and ended in June 2004.

Specifically, I conducted a case study of Anatolia College, a private, college-preparatory

high school in Thessaloniki, Greece from August - December 2002 and February - May

2004, a total of nearly ten months. In 2002, I spent approximately three days a week

observing history classrooms in the lyceum, interviewing students, teachers and

administrators, analyzing school documents such as the mission statement and curricular

materials, creating and administering a student questionnaire and interacting with

students in various other academic and non-academic settings. Although I remained in

Thessaloniki for the remainder of the academic year, most of this time was spent

81
translating and transcribing interviews and visiting the school on a more informal basis.

In February 2004, I returned in order to conduct member checks and additional classroom

observations and interviews. Moreover, during this time I administered a supplementary

question for the student questionnaire related to the May 2004 expansion of the European

Union to a small group of Greek lyceum and International Baccalaureate students.

Drawing from data collected through school observations, in-depth interviews, a

student questionnaire, and analysis of photographs and relevant documents, my project is

primarily qualitative. However, results from the student questionnaire have been

compiled and used quantitatively throughout the analysis. The study is also described as

a comparative one; between two distinct history education programs at a Greek high

school and between the culture of European consolidation and the discourses of cultural

identity constructed in the school context. I chose Anatolia College as the local setting

wherein I conducted my doctoral research for several reasons, described below, and I use

an ethnographic case study approach to carry it out. As I delineate my epistemological

and methodological positions in the following sections, “the centrality of the study of

culture in educational research” (Bruner, in Hall 1999, p. 121), is reinforced in distinct

ways.

Explicit Purposes and Research Questions

As Clifford Geertz states in The Interpretation of Cultures (1973), “[w]hat defines

it [ethnography] is the kind of intellectual effort it is: an elaborate venture in…“thick

description” (p. 6). Accordingly, the central purpose of my study is to use various data

collection methods to create “thick descriptions” of the complex arrangements of

82
Anatolia College, specifically, but not limited to the Greek lyceum and International

Baccalaureate history programs of the school. In this approach, Geertz explains that the

researcher is faced with “a multiplicity of complex conceptual structures, many of them

superimposed upon or knotted into one another, which are at once strange, irregular, and

inexplicit,” and which the researcher “must contrive somehow first to grasp and then to

render” (p. 10). As his statement suggests, the emphasis on complexity in ethnographic

research cannot be overstated or overlooked. Ethnography involves not only descriptions

of what one sees, but the interpretive rendering of those descriptions—to use a well-

known anthropological example, “the meaning embedded in the wink” (p. 6-9). From

this central objective, several related aims are identified.

Within the context of transnationalism, such as that taking place in the European

space, conducting a case study offers potential for exploring local meaning production of

issues related to school history in Europe, nationalism, and cultural identity. Specifically,

I explore how students negotiate knowledge in their history classrooms and engage in

particular discourses as a way of situating, describing and making meaning of their own

cultural identities. A final purpose relates to an inquiry into a center-periphery model and

the binary logic it implies. Specifically, the edict that national forces are weakening both

at the local level and in the global space will be taken up variously throughout the

project. While these explicit purposes outline my research of Anatolia College, the

following set of research questions, also stated in the Introduction, serve as a contingent

guide for it.

1. Anatolia College’s mission statement maintains that the school strives to be a

concrete expression of international values. What is the school’s educational
philosophy as articulated by the administration?

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 2. There are two distinct history programs, the Greek lyceum and the
International Baccalaureate, available to students at Anatolia College. How
do these two history programs compare with regard to knowledge production
and negotiation?

3. How can the particular discourses that Anatolia students employ in order to
situate themselves culturally be described? How do these discourses
contribute to a current narrative of Greekness and Europeanness?

4. In Europe, the issue of creating a collective identity among European youth is

situated in discourses of educational change. Is there a basis for a European
identity, a collective cultural identity, among Greek students at Anatolia
College?

5. How influential is school knowledge, particularly history education at

Anatolia College, in the processes of cultural identity?

6. What difficult questions may result from an ethnographic case study of

Anatolia College? How are these aporias productive, dangerous, and/or
seductive for studies of culture and education? In what directions do they lead
further research?

Addressing these questions in a mixed methods research design has resulted in

large volumes of text. A portion of this data is presented throughout the study in order to

represent the participants’ voices and experiences. Indeed, I ended up with more data

than I can possibly use in one doctoral thesis. That said, I employ grounded theory, in

part, to explore these questions, in an approach wherein I attempt to avoid a priori

theorizing, albeit not completely, and use “inductive guidelines for collecting and

analyzing data” (Charmaz, 2000, p. 509). While my research design is not purely

grounded, I use some constructivist grounded theory strategies.18 For instance, rather

than developing an a priori coding system, I coded data after collecting and reading it.

18
By constructivist, I recognize that the researcher creates the data and ensuing analyses through
interaction with participants. In other words, data do not provide a window on reality (see Chapter 19 in
Handbook of Qualitative Research (2000) for a discussion of the difference between constructivist and
objectivist grounded theory).
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This way, I tried to interact inductively with the data throughout analysis process. As

such, categories of meaning evolved from the data rather than from my own

preconceptions of what I might have “wanted” to see. In this way, grounded theory is

theory that “is derived from the data, systematically gathered and analyzed through the

research process” (Strauss & Corbin, 1994, p. 12).

Framing Epistemologies

Epistemologies provide much of the justification for particular methodologies,

i.e., the aim, function and assumptions of methods. Simply stated, epistemologies are

reflections of what it means to know (Schwandt, 1997, p. 39). Considering ethnographic

methodology, some postmodern critics question the very possibility of it as a way of

representing the experiences of another culture (Britzman, 1995; Wolf, 1992; Van

Maanen, 1995 et al). This type of questioning is a vital part of research, ethnographic or

otherwise. However, I believe that the potential dangers do not warrant the abandonment

of the methodology. Rather, they enrich it by continuously demanding researcher

reflexivity, the defamiliarizing of normalized assumptions and increasing comfort in

complexity. I find my research generally framed by a postmodern, interpretive

epistemology.

According to Denzin and Lincoln (2000), interpretive epistemologies are ways of

constructing knowledge as “the knower and the known interact and shape one another”

(p. 21). This implies that research is reciprocal and recursive. Postmodern approaches

more generally view forms of knowledge as always partial, positioned, and perspectival

(Lather, 2000). What this means for research is the replacement of master narratives with

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local, contextualized, and non-essentializing conceptual strategies. It does not mean that

modernist ways of knowing are rejected entirely. Rather, they are blended with new

ways of knowing to form new conceptualizations (St. Pierre, 2000; Middleton, 1996).

Educational ethnography, critiques withstanding, can help reveal the recursive role of

researcher and participants in the construction of description, interpretation and

representation of participants’ voices and experiences. As I delineate some of the

postmodern critiques of doing ethnography in later sections, the complexity of this

statement becomes more apparent.

Broadly, this is how I conduct research using qualitative, ethnographic methods.

It is a rewarding yet challenging process made up of thousands of critical decisions that,

together, attempt to inform the phenomenon of cultural identity in the school setting.

From the small, seemingly insignificant decisions to the more considerable discernments,

each determination contributes intimately to the wholeness of one’s interpretations. It is

a process of continual learning and expanding the circumference of visible perspectives.

It is cathartic in the sense that old ideas are often reshaped or replaced with new insights

and new understandings. It is paradoxical in the way the ethnographer describes,

interprets and searches for meaning, as if research is producing reality. Importantly, the

process is not unidirectional, but rather a cooperative, rhizomatic endeavor that allows for

“the proliferation of ruptures and discontinuities that, in turn, create other linkages”

(Alvermann, 2000, p. 118). In short, ethnographic research is a labyrinth with many

possible routes but no privileged solutions.

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Anatolia College: The Setting and Negotiating Entry

Anatolia College is a non-state Greek college-preparatory high school attracting

students from many areas of Thessaloniki and other parts of northern Greece. I arrived in

Thessaloniki one month prior to beginning my fieldwork in August 2002 in order to

begin acquainting myself with the city. It is the second largest city in Greece and the

capital of the Greek province of Macedonia. Located in northern Greece, the city was

named after the half sister of Alexander the Great, which translates as “Thessalonian

victory.” It was the second most important city in the Byzantine Empire, next to

Constantinople, and is full of Byzantine architecture. In the 15th century, it was a haven

for Jews exiled from Spain, who became an important part of the culture until almost the

entire population was sent to and perished in concentration camps during the Nazi

occupation of the city, thus ending a period of four hundred years of Jewish influence.

This period also roughly corresponds with the occupation of Greece by the Ottoman

Turks (1430-1912). It became part of the modern nation-state of Greece in 1913 and

today it is a lively city with an estimated population of one million, out of a total Greek

population of approximately 10.5 million.

Anatolia College is overseen by a Greek and American Board of Trustees and

historically appoints an American President and a Greek Vice President. According to

the school mission statement, the principles that guide Anatolia are service to one's

fellow man, respect for Greek culture, belief in democracy, and devotion to academic

excellence. Today, Anatolia is composed of three distinct divisions: a six-year high

school (Greek gymnasium and lyceum and International Baccalaureate) with

approximately 1,245 students, a four-year liberal arts university (American College of

87
Thessaloniki) with approximately 750 students from 23 countries, and a one-year

English-language Secretarial School. My research focuses only on the Greek lyceum and

International Baccalaureate parts of Anatolia. The former may be considered similar to

Greek public schools for the reasons mentioned above, however, it is not a representative

Greek high school in that it is private and students pay tuition, it has a boarding

department for students from other regions of Greece, it has an extensive extra-curricular

program, there is an intensive English language program required of all students, and it

holds the reputation, deservedly or not, as an elite high school in Greece. There is a

tremendous middle class demand for admission and this is offset through a strong

scholarship program. Thus, while the majority of the student body comes from middle-

class and upper middle-class families in Thessaloniki, eleven percent of its population is

scholarship students both from the city and other, more rural parts of northern Greece.

One of the first memories of arriving at my research site is the interview that I

gave for In Focus, the school newspaper. The vice president suggested that the

newspaper interview me since I was going to be a new and frequent face on campus.

During the interview, the student asked, “Why did you choose Anatolia College for your

research? I told him that the answer to this question is complex. First, I am interested in

the richness of northern Greece, especially Thessaloniki, a city comprising a population

whose views stand in contradistinction to those of the people living in Athens. Much

attention has been placed on Athens in the study of Greek culture, perhaps because it has

a greater population. Indeed, close to half of the Greek population lives there. Or,

perhaps it is due to the well-known history of its classical past as opposed to other areas

in Greece who are associated with different historical periods, such as the Byzantine past.

88
Most likely, Athens has become the hegemonic center of Greece for a multiplicity of

reasons. Thus, I hoped to find it productive to move away from the dominant center in

my own study. My next criterion was to find a school where students have exposure to

and opportunities for international involvement. For example, Anatolia College has one

of the few International Baccalaureate programs in Greece, and the only IB program

outside of Athens.19 Next, it is involved in several major international activities,

including the European Youth Parliament, a European youth organization whose

objective is the promotion of a united Europe and Model United Nations, a worldwide

program promoting an awareness of the multifaceted responsibilities of the United

Nations. In addition, the school boasts a very strong English program and it is self-

described as an internationally-minded school with both Greek and American roots. A

final reason for choosing the school relates to the important research consideration of

access. In short, I had access through my relationship with an alumnus of the school. In

Greece, this last reason is an important one. Through my association with Greeks in the

United States as well as my experience living in Greece, it is my observation that Greeks,

in general, are quite suspicious of the type of observational research that I was

conducting and this makes it difficult to gain access as an outsider. However, having the

endorsement of an alumnus of the school, who wrote a first letter of contact on my

behalf, made the acceptance of my proposal more likely. Indeed, the faculty and

19
As of April 2005, the following schools in Athens offer IB Diploma (final two years of high school)
programs: American Community Schools of Athens, Campion School, Costeas-Gitonas School, Doukas
School, Geitonas School, H.A.E.F. (Psychico College), I.M. Panayotopoulos School, Moraitis School, St.
Catherine’s British Embassy School and The International School of Athens. One additional school,
Pinewood International School, located on the campus of Anatolia College, currently offers the IB Diploma
program as well. However, beginning in September 2005, this program will merge with Anatolia’s IB
program.
89
administration at Anatolia welcomed my research not with idle acceptance, but rather

with critical participation.

I found that negotiating entry is a balanced process involving an implicit

“contract” with participants and explicit articulations of the project. It involves

establishing rapport and treating the relationship between participants and myself always

as a reciprocal one. On a fundamental level, issues of informed consent, voluntary

participation, confidentiality, opportunities to withdrawal and clearly defined

expectations were openly discussed. In my case, I contacted the Vice President in charge

of high school operations. Afterwards, I sent him a solicitation letter, wherein I presented

my proposed research plan to him. As the “gatekeeper,” my initial contact with him was

crucial. Upon reviewing my proposal, he agreed to take it to the school’s deans for

approval. This was the second step in the entry process. As this took place, I began

thinking about issues of trust. I expect that this is one of the most basic, yet important

responsibilities of doing research. Indeed, as I negotiated with teachers and students for

participation, data collection and all subsequent outcomes were influenced by my ability

to build trustworthy relationships with them. The Vice President of Anatolia expresses

this issue in another e-mail correspondence.

One issue that needs to be resolved, now that the Deans have agreed to
allow the research to place place [sic], is to discuss your presence in the
classroom with the relevant teachers of history and literature. It may be
that not all history and literature teachers will agree to have you observe
their classes; I haven’t discussed it with them yet. For example, it may be
that only 4-5 teachers will feel comfortable enough, and that you’ll have to
limit classroom observations to a subset of all available classrooms. You
need to be prepared for that possibility (3/1/2002).

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As Dr. Zodhiates predicted, not all teachers were interested or comfortable taking part in

my research project. On October 2, 2002, I conducted a meeting with the schools’

philologues (humanities teachers) in order to introduce myself, present my research goals

to them (Appendix C) and solicit volunteers for my study. In all, seven faculty members,

five from the Greek lyceum and two from the International Baccalaureate program,

agreed to participate. In addition, five members of the administration, including the two

deans from the Greek lyceum, the director of the International Baccalaureate program,

the vice president in charge of high school operations and the president of the College

participated. I was pleased and grateful that all those who participated were

conscientiously involved, accommodating and generous with their time and classrooms.

Throughout the ensuing sections, I expose the varying ways in which my general

epistemological framework, as described above, is contextualized in the data; first as I

outline a justification for my methodological approaches, describe the specifics of my

data collection methods and data results, and finally, as I consider advantages and

challenges of the research design.

METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH

Interpretivists such as Geertz (1973) and Denzin (1988) base an understanding of

theory on interpretation, or the act of making sense out of a social interaction. Thus, for

them, theory building arises and advances through “thick description”, defined as

“description that goes beyond the mere or bare reporting of an act (thin description), but

describes and probes the intentions, motives, meanings, contexts, situations and

circumstances of action” (Glesne, 1999, p. 22). I believe that theory should be built

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during research, rather than imposing it entirely a priori onto situations. However,

theories and methods inform one another (Gee, 1999), so my research approaches suggest

that theory always is established prior to research.

Justification for Doing an Ethnographic Case Study

Based on my conceptual framework, educational ethnography, in the form of a

single case study, is a productive methodology for engaging with Greek students,

teachers and administrators in Greece. With data gathered, descriptions and

interpretations of cultural phenomena within the local context of a Greek high school,

which is embedded in a transnational setting, as described in the literature, may lead to

further inquiries into nationalism, education and cultural identity in Greece. However, as

Robert Stake states, “[c]ase studies may be of value for refining theory and suggesting

complexities for further investigation, as well as helping to establish the limits of

generalizability” (Denzin & Lincoln, 2000, p. 448). Correspondingly, Robert Arnove

(1999) suggests in an article attempting to reframe comparative education, that “case

studies are likely to continue to be the most commonly used approach to studying

education-society relations,” and the most valuable will be those that are conducted in

local schools in peripheral settings (p. 14-15).

Case studies have their pitfalls, also. Among them is the danger in attempting to

generalize from one case to other instances that are not appropriate. Another is to view

the world from a myopic lens. Both of these snares are potentially dangerous in doing

case studies in Europe. Because Europe is consciously working to unify its space, the

seduction to make generalizations may be strong. At the same time, examining a local

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setting without framing it in the context of European projects that are resolutely

permeating regional spheres neglects the force of globalization taking place in the world

today.

Finally, it is my own assumption that cultural processes in education do not flow

only from the center to the periphery, but works as a more sophisticated interplay of

movements. Thus, while case studies have their limits, their contribution to micro-level

understandings in different types of school settings, especially those outside the northern

and western industrialized zones of Europe, and at varying historical periods, has further

potential for describing and generating local understandings in the wider framework of

global processes. In turn, such research may be used to build upon existing collections of

case studies and generate new understandings and relationships in different types of

historical and social configurations (Arnove, 1999, p. 14).

Debates about the “politics and poetics of ethnographic fieldwork and

representation” have produced creative innovations as well as conflict and tension (Hall,

1999). Clifford Geertz (1994) identifies a growing appreciation for the complexity of

doing ethnographic research in an increasingly transnational world (in Kearney, 1995).

With this in mind, any attempt to justify a methodological approach must foreground the

limits of that methodology—to critique it—which implies the necessity to work under

erasure.20 Thus, what are some critiques of ethnographic fieldwork?

20
I define working under erasure as being suspicious of one’s aims, methods and interpretations while
simultaneously knowing that they cannot be negated. In other words, it means doing research and troubling
it at the same time (Lather, Ed. P&L 871 seminar). For example, I use ethnography while realizing that
there are limits to its usefulness. Similarly, I use a concept like “center-periphery,” but always question its
binary logic and work to transcend it.
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Criticisms of the Methodology

Criticisms of qualitative research methodologies, particularly ethnography, seem

to relate either to epistemological questions or ethical questions. Regarding the first,

criticisms arise as to whether we can come to know a phenomenon and likewise, what

counts as knowing (Glesne, 1999, p. 15). Regarding the latter, ethical questions of

should researchers confront and work to change oppressive situations that they encounter

and if so, how can they (p. 15). These “categories” of criticism are interwoven into

specific issues of doing ethnographic research, particularly authority, audience and

authorship.

Deborah Britzman (1995) states that three kinds of ethnographic authority are

questioned in postmodern/poststructural epistemologies: “the authority of empiricism, the

authority of language and the authority of reading” (p. 230). I summarize a series of

questions that she poses: What does it mean to disrupt the idea that there is a real

experience out there to narrate and to read? What does it mean to disrupt the stability of

language—to know that meanings change over time and in different contexts? What

happens to the authority of reading if we begin from the perspective that there is no such

thing as an innocent reading? As Britzman points out, these difficult questions surround

the doing and the reading of educational ethnography (p. 230). These questions

challenge the ethnographer to think differently about what her descriptions represent.

They incorporate suspicion, contestation and doubt into the grounds of ethnographic

authority. This sort of reflexivity of one’s work is productive and complicated. I, along

with Britzman, believe that ethnography can offer education a more complicated version

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of how life is lived, but this cannot be accomplished without also addressing the

contradictions that it exposes (p. 231).

When I speak of audience, I am concerned with whom the ethnographer writes for

and what her responsibilities to them consist of. One distinction is that between

academic writing and writing for the community, the latter of whom may or may not be

immersed in an academic environment. Who, then, is the research audience?

Postmodernists have been criticized for using obscure language that makes it difficult for

anyone but highly trained specialists to dispute (Wolf, 1992, p. 119). Likewise, many

researchers believe that the readership of research projects must not be confined to

intellectual elites (p. 119). Thus the answer to the question is embedded in the idea of

research reciprocity. I believe that my research must be accessible to both the academic

community to which I belong as well as Anatolia College, the community of which I am

a part in Greece. What is the point of research if it is not accessible, especially to

research participants? In my case, this is distinctly reinforced in the e-mail

correspondence below from the overseer of my project at Anatolia College, Dr. Phaedon

Zodhiates.

The topics you propose to investigate—cultural identity, educational

changes and ideological influences—are fascinating and your research
perhaps could help us, too, better understand some of the changes that are
taking place among our Greek students (2/25/02).

Another concern regarding audience relates to form. Postmodern researchers

recommend new forms of presenting written research. Feeling constrained by the idea of

presenting information in the format seen only in journals and book chapters in the

academic corpus, postmodern researchers consider alternative narrative styles to be

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equally representative (Wolf, 1992; Denzin & Lincoln, 2000; Glesne, 1999). Norman

Denzin considers this idea when he states,

Nor do I distinguish literary, nonliterary, fictional, and nonfictional textual

forms. These are socially and politically constructed categories. They are
too often used to police certain transgressive writing forms, such as
fictional ethnographies. There is only narrative—that is, only different
genre-defined ways of representing and writing about experiences and
their multiple realities. The discourses of the postmodern world
constantly intermingle literary, poetic, journalistic, fictional, cinematic,
documentary, factual, and ethnographic writing and representation. No
form is privileged over others (Denzin & Lincoln, 2000, p. 899).

If I focus on the final sentence, “No form is privileged over others,” the trouble of

balancing innovation with status quo comes into view. Although I agree that alternative

forms of representing research have productive as well as dangerous potentials, I also

know that there are specific forms of research writing that are privileged in the context of

publishing. In the analysis of this doctoral study, particularly Chapter 4, I incorporate

observational vignettes as a way to make meaning of my data. While this writing style

may be viewed as “not academic writing,” I find it a useful way of engaging with my

data.

Closely related to criticisms above is the issue of authorship, particularly the

debate over polyvocality. Some researchers challenge and seek to de-center the

researcher by making him “a visible partner in dialogue, a datum himself or herself”

(Fontana 1994, p. 212, in Glesne, 1999, p. 15). Thus, in writing, postmodern researchers

often work to produce a polyvocal text, one that has many voices beyond the researcher’s

own (p. 15). The political position of those who commit to share authorship between

researcher and informants may produce positive outcomes in that it causes the researcher

to continually go back to informants when producing written research reports. However,

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the feasibility of doing so was limited in my case. While I did perform member checks

with participants, the write up is completely from my own analyses and interpretations.

Thus, even though I use multiple voices to tell my analytical story, it does not overcome

the fact that my choices during data collection, analysis and write up are still a reflection

of whose voices are heard and whose are not.

Clearly there is no best way to do and write ethnographic fieldwork, but the

degree to which ethnographers appropriate the experience of their informants and

interpret it for meaning is a reflection of the importance of reflexivity in qualitative

research. I see postmodern epistemologies not as the answer for how to do good research

but as a positive force in emphasizing the need for researchers to be self-reflexive about

the limitations of their work. This means coming to terms with the idea that experience is

messy, thus attempts to describe and interpret experiences of people will be messy, too.

It also means that our interpretations and understandings may simply be “increased

distance from falsity rather than closeness to truth…” (Kuhn, in Wolf 1992, p. 125). This

last point became increasingly situated in my mind during the write up of my data. I

admit that I found it disturbing, to some extent, that I was so consciously choosing to use

certain data and choosing to omit other data. For me, the analysis and write up stages

make transparent the volatility and untidiness of meaning production in the research

process.

DATA COLLECTION METHODS

Doing ethnography, as Geertz explains, is like “trying to read a

manuscript—foreign, faded, full of ellipses, incoherencies, suspicious emendations, and

97
tendentious commentaries…” (Geertz, 1973, p. 10). Thus, the methods of data collection

necessarily need to be varied in order to describe and interpret participants’ behaviors and

thoughts in different situations. A mixed methods research design and varied methods of

data collection contribute to this effort. However, before leaving for Greece, I was

required to complete the IRB procedure for conducing research involving human

subjects.

In the field, I used four methods to gather information: participant observation, in-

depth interviews, a grounded questionnaire and photographic representation. Although I

treat them separately below, I stress that these data collection methods are overlapping in

the context of conducting fieldwork.

Participant Observation

Although the participant-observer role may lean more towards participation or

more towards observation, it most likely will change along a continuum over the research

period (44). Indeed, during my fieldwork, this was certainly the case. According to

Glesne in Becoming Qualitative Researchers (1999), the main outcome of participant

observation is to understand the research setting, its participants, and their behavior (p.

45). It means learning from participants rather than studying them. In the study, I

completed twelve formal and forty-eight informal classroom and school observations

with participating teachers and students in the following class types:

Form 4 (10th grade): Ancient History

Form 5 (11th grade): Greek History

International Baccalaureate 1 History
English

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 Form 6 (12th grade): Contemporary Greek History
Special Topics in Greek History
International Baccalaureate 2 History
Modern Greek literature
Essay Critique of Greek History
English.

By formal, I am referring to prearranged observations wherein I was given

permission to audialy record the lesson and participated in the activity of the class in

various ways. This included introducing myself and my research project, leading class

discussions wherein there was an overlap between my research and to the curriculum

(e.g., the enlargement of the European Union in 12th Grade Contemporary History),

reading aloud passages from the textbook with students, asking questions and sharing

opinions on topics of discussion. Formal observations were always carried out on the

initial engagement to a class and my presence was viewed less as a researcher and more

as an active class visitor. By contrast, informal observations are designated as those

wherein my participation involved sitting in on classes, usually in the back or side of the

room, to observe and record fieldnotes only. Thus, my presence was viewed as a familiar

researcher. Informal observations were more concurring to the culture of the school and

Greece for two reasons. First, they were set up in a spontaneous manner (e.g., When

talking with teachers in the faculty lounge, they regularly invited me to observe that day,

frequently the next period) and second, they were not tape-recorded, an action viewed

with varying degrees of suspicion by most participants.

Both types of observations yielded a great amount of recorded data. However,

contrary to prior expectations, each yielded similar data. In other words, it did not appear

that teachers did anything “special” when they knew I was visiting, at least as far as I can

99
compare formal and informal observations with the same set of students and teacher. For

me, this reflected a level of confidence among faculty and their teaching practices,

especially since I was told by two members of the administration that outside observers,

traditionally, are viewed with mistrust and skepticism among faculty in their teaching

environment. For this reason, I attempted to make explicit that my purpose was

exploratory but not fault seeking.

It was during classroom observations that I solicited student participation.

Specifically, at the end of each formal class visit I was given the opportunity to pass out

student and parent letters describing my research and a student consent form for those

interested in granting me an individual or group interview and for those interested in

completing the questionnaire that was constructed for students during the year (Appendix

A). From this method, I received interest from and conducted in-depth interviews with

and gathered photographic representations from twenty-one students and conducted a

group interview with eight students. In addition, I administered the student questionnaire

to 101 students, 20 of which were discarded due to an error in the collection process.

Importantly, these formal and informal classroom observations comprise only part of the

observation process. During my time at Anatolia, I also attended school assemblies,

including those for OXI Day, St. Demetrius Day and Polytechnio Day21 and I was invited

to countless functions funded by the school, including faculty meetings, the faculty

welcoming party, the Dukakis Lecture series, the inauguration of the new school library,
21
October 28th is OXI Day, a day commemorating the retreat of the Italian troops from the borders of
Greece at the start of WWII. “OXI” means “NO” and refers in this context to Greek General Metaxas’
strong reply of “oxi” (no) to Mussolini’s request to allow Italian troops into Greece at the beginning of
WWII. October 26th is St. Demetrius’ Day, the patron saint of Thessaloniki. November 17th is Polytechnio
Day, a day of remembrance for those students who lost their lives when the military dictatorship sent tanks
and troops into the Polytechnic School in Athens to break up a student protest in 1973.

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an exhibit of the history of Anatolia College at the Kentro Istorias Thessalonikis

(Thessaloniki Historic Center), the Makis Tselios fashion show to raise money for the

Anatolia College Scholarship program, and the yearly Thanksgiving and Halloween

parties in the dormitory to name only a few. By the end of the first month, I was

beginning to feel less of an outsider and more of a part of the Anatolia College

community, I was familiar with the daily rhythm of the school, students wondered less

about my presence and I was welcomed into classrooms with interest by faculty and

students. This sort of reception by participants in the research site contributed, I believe,

to the successful gathering of the data as described below.

Individual and Group Interviews

Based on observations, I created interview schedules (Appendix E) to guide single

and group discussions with students, teachers and administrators. Although I was

required by The Ohio State University IRB Human Subjects Board to present interview

questions prior to beginning my research, I reworked those initial questions considerably

after spending time in the field. By grounding my interview questions in prior

observations, I was able to construct emic, or insider categories of meaning (Pelto &

Pelto, 1984) for use during interviews. Knowing the names of people, buildings, school

traditions and other school-specific terminology contributed to an enhanced rapport with

participants and reduced opportunities for misunderstandings. Concurrently, all

interviews, except for those few native speakers of English, were conducted in Greek.

Overall, the interview questions were intended to invite stories, ask open-ended

questions, and provide the opportunity for unexpected avenues of thought from

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participants. The result was in-depth individual discussions of approximately one-hour

each with the aforementioned members of the student body, faculty, administration,

thirty-eight in all. I was given permission to tape record each interview and these

translations (with some help from native speakers) and subsequent transcriptions were

completed by me.

Of the student volunteers, in-depth interviews were conducted with five 11th grade

Greek lyceum, three 12th grade Greek lyceum, eight 11th grade IB, and five 12th grade IB

students. Short, individual follow-up interviews were conducted with the same students

after turning in their photographs (see below). I believe that I would have had more

participation had there not been a requirement to sign a consent form. In my fieldwork

experience, the commitment to sign an “official-looking” document was viewed with

great suspicion among the Greek community in which I was involved, especially the

parent constituency. The same held true for the grounded questionnaire. Thus, I had

many students tell me that they were interested in participating, however, their parents

refused to sign the consent forms. However, many of these students shared perspectives

with me during classroom observations and casual conversations around campus. With

the adult volunteers, the same held true in that they were suspicious of signing a consent

form. However, I was able to use verbal consent from most of these participants since

they were over 18 years of age.

Student Questionnaire

From the varied perceptual responses in the in-depth interviews, I created a

questionnaire (Appendix A) for administration to all interested student participants in the

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Greek lyceum and IB program at Anatolia College. From the questionnaire, I gathered

biographical information, elicited perceptions about European unity, Greek national

identity and history education Anatolia College. It asked students to categorize,

prioritize, and respond to various closed-ended question types. The inspiration and

model used for the questionnaire came from the Youth and History project described in

the introduction. Thus, questionnaire included a combination of questions from the Youth

and History survey and questions designed specifically by me for the Anatolia student

community. The purpose of the questionnaire was to have some element of

representativeness and comparability to other qualitative data gathered, not to make broad

generalizations but to explore continuities and/or discontinuities present in the

community. Ultimately, I received consent forms from and administered the

questionnaire to 101 students in 11th and 12th grades of the Greek lyceum and the IB

program either during their free time or history class periods (when permitted by the

teacher). Students completed the questionnaire anonymously and I monitored and

answered any questions during the administration process. Unfortunately, twenty of the

competed questionnaires were lost in the collection process, thus leaving 81 for analysis

(60 from the Greek lyceum and 21 from the International Baccalaureate division). These

results were compiled in the form of mean scores and bar graphs representing

comparisons between Greek lyceum and International Baccalaureate students’ responses.

The mean scores for each question are found in Appendix B. This form of data collection

proved to be a nice complement to the extensive interview and observational data that

was collected and provided a form of triangulation of the data as some topics were

covered both on the questionnaire and in other collection methods.

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Photographic Representation

Another type of analysis, although different from the above, is analysis of

photographs. As stated in Comparative Education Review (1999), “a multiplicity of data

representations that welcome artistic, linguistic, and visual alternatives along with more

traditional positivistic choices” are necessary variations in educational research (Ninnes).

This position supports my investment in using photographic representations taken by

students at Anatolia College to provide a forum for analyzing cultural identity, i.e.,

looking at constructions of the world from symbols in photographs. Specifically, during

my first interview with each student I gave him or her a disposable camera and asked him

or her to take five photographs that “in some way represent his or her identity as a

Greek.” After turning in the “assignment,” I developed each roll of film and conducted

short, individual or group interviews to discuss the representations chosen for

representation in their photographs. I ended up with 76 well-printed photographs and

was able to meet with and discuss these photographs with most students. Unfortunately, I

tried to do this during a time when students are studying for the Panhellenic

examinations, the national examinations given in the Greek lyceum, and I found out very

quickly that this is one of the most stressful, demanding and tedious memorization

processes for Greek students.

At the close of the data collection phase in 2004, I returned to The Ohio State

University with a large volume of data and I can say with confidence that it has gone

through many transformations in the process of this study. In Becoming Qualitative

Researchers: An Introduction (1999), Corrine Glesne cites H. Wolcott’s

conceptualization of the data analysis process that I find useful in discussing this data

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transformation process. He describes three categories: “description, analysis and

interpretation, as three means of data transformation, or moving from organization to

meaning” (p. 149). According to Wolcott, description means staying close to the data in

a way that attempts to describe what is there. Analysis, the second category of data

transformation, is the identification of patterns, trends or themes in the data, i.e., key

factors and the relationships among them. Finally, interpretation is Wolcott’s third means

of data transformation. In this stage, theory is employed in a way that extends the

analysis and begins to probe what is to be made of the data (p. 150). It is with this

framework that I attempt to code and transform my observational notes, interview

transcripts, photographs and answers on a questionnaire in order to make a more or less

coherent representation, in writing, of an observed cultural phenomenon. Thus, in my

selecting, narrating, contextualizing and translating this data to produce rich descriptions,

James Clifford (1990) reminds me that my descriptions are not merely

interpretations—they are constructions.

ADVANTAGES AND CHALLENGES OF THE RESEARCH DESIGN

Trustworthiness

Questions about what constitutes a valid claim to understand cultures, ways of

life, and experiences different from one’s own, along with which voices and perspectives

are presented in what form is a primary concern within educational research (Hall 1999).

The literature on qualitative research that I have read asserts that the use of multiple data

collection methods contributes to the trustworthiness of the data (Denzin & Lincoln,

2000; Spindler, 1997; Glesne, 1999; Wolf, 1992). The reliance on multiple methods, or

105
triangulation, in qualitative research is crucial. The purpose of triangulation is not simply

to combine different types of data, “but the attempt to relate them so as to counteract the

threats to validity identified in each” (p. 31). In addition, commonly cited procedures

that work to maximize the trustworthiness of one’s research include prolonged

engagement, persistent observation, peer review and debriefing, member-checking, thick

descriptions, external audits and researcher reflexivity. The following descriptions

emphasize issues of trustworthiness in my own project.

Field Notes: Rich description from data collection methods is one of the most important

aspects of doing ethnography. Equally important is immediate reflection on notes taken

each day. Thus, I devised a system for observation and reflection wherein I typed notes

immediately after each observation or day. Sometimes this was at the end of the day

when I returned to my apartment and other times it was the next day. It was a tedious

process, but I believe that keeping in touch with my research helped me use those

descriptions meaningfully and validly.

Triangulation: My study is designed to use varied methods for gathering research data

(as described above). Additionally, I successfully gathered data from various sources,

including students, teachers, administrators, school documents and data from being “a

part of the culture.”

Prolonged Engagement: It took time for the community at Anatolia to get used to the

presence of a stranger. Thus, I spent three full days per week in the school in order to

address this issue. This allowed students and faculty to get to know me and understand

my purpose for being there. The length of my stay, one full academic year (over a two

year period), contributed to this purpose as well.

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Self-reflexivity: Descriptions that I construct in this doctoral study are my own

interpretations of situations. Thus, the issue of bias is one that is constantly reflected

upon. At times, I felt as if I was hearing what I want to hear or seeing what I want to see

because I had preconceived ideas about an event, person, or situation. At other times this

was not the case. The validity of the project, however, depends on a continual

exploration of my own subjectivity and I attempt to challenge my own biases by

continually revisiting my data during the processes of data collection, analysis and write

up.

Interpretation and Representation

As John Van Maanen (1995) candidly states in An End to Innocence: The

Ethnography of Ethnography, “the cultural representation business has become quite

tricky” (p. 2). Two issues that seem to dominate my thoughts regarding interpretation

and representation in my study are blurred genres and research transparency. I first came

across the term “blurred genres” in Geertz (1983) chapter on the issue. According to

him, “Something is happening to the way we think about the way we think” (p. 20). He

points to examples of philosophical inquiries looking like literary criticism, parables

posing as ethnographies and theoretical treatises set out as travelogues (p. 20). He

proposes that researchers today are “free to shape their work in terms of its necessities

rather than according to received ideas as to what they ought or ought not to be doing” (p.

21). With the blurring of disciplinary boundaries, new ways of interpreting and

representing data have emerged as acceptable. I see productive possibilities in blending,

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for example, educational studies with cultural studies and perspectives on nationalism.

This is evident in the analysis of my data.

The second issue, research transparency, is equally important. I believe the

inclusion of the author’s voice in the writing of research makes visible to the reader the

processes that are hidden beneath the mask of a neat, tidy final “report.” It means making

clear the ways in which “the conceptual frames which researchers bring to bear when

they ask questions, observe and write are themselves historical, cultural etc. products”

(Middleton, 1996, p. 19).

Language Issues

As a non-native speaker of the modern Greek language, the issue of translation

must be addressed. I possess a competent, yet not fluent, understanding of the spoken

and written language. As all of the interviews and classroom observations, except for

those with native English speakers, were conducted in Greek, the ability for me to follow

conversations was not always satisfactory. Great preparations went into designing

interview questions and thinking about vocabulary necessary for engaging with each

participant, the ability to converse with spontaneity was limiting at times. Fortunately, I

was given permission to record interviews and classroom observations and I spent a great

many hours translating and transcribing these records in detail. It was during the

interviews and observations where I felt my greatest language shortcomings. In addition,

had to seek assistance from native speakers of Greek for interpretations of specific

phrases, especially those idiomatic uses of language with which I was unfamiliar.

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Ultimately, I feel that there were lost opportunities in the data collection phase due to my

own language insufficiencies.

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 CHAPTER 5

DEVELOPING STUDENT HISTORICAL CONSCIOUSNESS THROUGH

OFFICIAL AND CRITICAL KNOWLEDGE

In this chapter, I begin by exploring themes that contribute to the framing of a

functioning educational philosophy for Anatolia College. In doing so, I set the contextual

stage for analyzing how faculty and students perceive school history from the perspective

of their place in two different programs offered at the institution. Specifically, I identify

and explore two ways of knowing that students negotiate in their history classes at the

school. It is my supposition that the explicit/implicit structure of these two forms of

knowledge, official and critical, play a reflective role in students’ orientation not only to

specific topics of study in the history classroom, but in the broader development of an

historical consciousness among them. The general conclusion is that there exists a

relationship between the pedagogy of official/critical knowledge and historical

consciousness, concepts that are precisely defined in the chapter.

AN INTERNATIONAL ORIENTATION TO EDUCATION

Anatolia College, a private college-preparatory boarding school, has a notably

dignified international history and has long been considered one of the most distinguished

educational institutions in Greece. It evolved from a religious seminary established near

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Constantinople, now Istanbul, Turkey, in 1840, and it was officially designated Anatolia

College in 1886 in Merzifon, Asia Minor by American missionaries. The school was

forced to close after the Turkish-Greek war in 1921 and was relocated to Thessaloniki,

Greece in 1924 at the invitation of the Greek Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos.

While in Asia Minor, the school consisted of mostly Greek and Armenian students and

many of its first students in Thessaloniki were welcomed as refugees. The College

moved to its present 45-acre campus in Pylea, just outside Thessaloniki, in 1934.

During World War II it went through several permutations. In October 1940, the

college was forced to close again, and thus, offered its buildings as a military hospital for

wounded Greeks returning from the Italian front. While the Italian invasion was gallantly

stifled, the advance of the German army was not. From April 1941 until October 1944,

the Anatolia campus was the German headquarters for operations in the Balkans. Soon

after they left, the British army moved in and occupied campus buildings and structures

erected by the Germans (Iatridis & Compton, 1986). The British moved out of the

main buildings in time for the re-opening of the school in September 1945, although one

unit remained on campus in German-built barracks until December 1945. Many students

lost one or both parents in the war and the Greek-Jewish students suffered the greatest

accumulated loss (Compton, 2002).22 Again in 1974, after the Turkish invasion of

Cyprus, the College welcomed refugees fleeing the war-torn Mediterranean island. This

benevolent tradition continues today at the school in the form of a well-developed

22
Before the war Thessaloniki had a Jewish population of over 60,000, most of them descendants of people
who had fled from Spain hundreds of years ago to escape the terrors of the Inquisition. One of the greatest
tragedies of the war was the destruction of this community by the German army. Soon after their
occupation of Thessaloniki they forced the Jewish people from their homes and sent them to concentration
camps where most of them died (Iatridis & Compton, 1986).
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outreach program for disadvantaged youth from rural mountain and island areas within

Greece. Thus, while the reputation of the school is that of a select private school serving

the wealthy, the express mission of the current president is to further position Anatolia as

a “social contributor rather than a detached school for the elite” (President Interview,

2/18/2003).

Today, Anatolia’s secondary division “is deeply embedded in northern Greece

and shaped by traditions evolving over its 156-year history” (President’s Report 2002, p.

3).23 Three integral administrators: the President of the College, the Vice President in

charge of Secondary Education, and the Director of the International Baccalaureate

program, agree on varying levels that Anatolia is a well-established educational

institution with “a deserved reputation for academic quality and integrity” (ibid.).

Moreover, interviews with each administrator reveal two consistent themes that

contribute to the framing of a functioning educational philosophy for the school.

Specifically, the presence of an international orientation to education is perceived to be in

place at the school and this is a continually desired ambition of each administrator at his

respective level of responsibility. Encompassing this is each administrator’s

identification of Thessaloniki, the city in which the school is situated, as a politically and

culturally conservative city, making the maintenance between maintaining tradition and

pursuing change within the school an existing and complex project. As the president

states, “[t]he balance between continuity/tradition and innovation/change is clearly a

moving target in today’s environment…” (ibid., p.4). He articulates Anatolia’s

23
This research focuses on the lyceum (last three years of high school) and hereafter, all references to
“Anatolia College,” “the College” or “the school” shall be in reference to this level unless otherwise stated.
112
internationally minded orientation as follows and sets an outline for discussing the

administration’s perspective on the school.

So, we’re international in three dimensions. One, that common history of Greece
and Turkey. Two, the fact that we’re an American institution charted in
Massachusetts in 1894 and operating in Greece. And as we say, [we] try to meld
the best of Greek and American secondary education in a way that implies not
being simply another Greek school in Greece but adding an American value,
which I would call international. We, of course, in more recent years have added
the International Baccalaureate program which is a purely international education
that is accepted by 140 or so countries and uses a curriculum that’s made up and
administered from Switzerland (President Interview, 2/18/2003).

Historical Roots in Asia Minor

The President describes the school’s particularly strong ties to Turkey as one

dimension of the school’s internationally minded orientation and supports this statement

by citing the school’s honored origins in Asia Minor and its establishment of a number of

affiliations with “sister” schools in Turkey.24 His statements suggest one way that the

existing and complex project of tradition and change is played out at the managerial

level. Mainly, the distinction between Asia Minor and Turkey is the significant factor in

understanding this dimension. Historically, ties to the former are viewed with distinction

from a Greek cultural perception. In contrast, Greece’s adversarial relationship with the

latter is well known. Before the establishment of the Turkish Republic in 1923, Asia

Minor was home to Greeks, Turks, Armenians and a host of other ethnic groups and

24
Their strongest relationship is with Roberts College, a school similar to Anatolia in Turkey. Each year,
students and teachers from the two schools participate in an exchange program.

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within this cultural context Greeks were among a successful merchant class. This

changed after the population exchange in 1923-1924.25

Taken together, there exists an implied suggestion, at least from the executive

level, that students are taught to respect the past while simultaneously learning to move

beyond anachronistic national rivalries in a way that reject ethnocentrism and avoids

plunging back into history. As Ioakimidis states, “…the emphasis on history makes

Greece quite reluctant to enter into negotiations that result in compromise. Indeed, the

very term “compromise” is anathema to many Greeks, especially with regard to so-called

“national issues”” (Ioakimidis, 1999, p. 179). Anatolia’s educational philosophy wishes

to reject this way of thinking by placing emphasis both on the school’s historic roots in

Asia Minor and equally on the development of student and faculty exchanges with

schools like theirs in Turkey. Interestingly, despite this orientation from the

administrative level, the later analysis of identity among Anatolia students contends that

the burden of history is not so easily overcome and continues to be an influential

discourse of cultural identity for them.

Influences from America

A second dimension of Anatolia’s international orientation relates to the

institution’s American roots. As a school founded by American missionaries, there is a

sense at the administrative level that the best of Greek and American ideals permeate the

25
The Lausanne Treaty in July 1923 provided for the official exchange of populations after the defeat of
the Greeks by the Turks. The Greeks in Turkey were to be sent to Greece and the Turks in Greece to
Turkey. An exception was made for the Greeks in Istanbul and for the Turks in Thrace, which had been
Turkish property but was now a part of Greece. This exchanges was negotiated under the direction of the
League of Nations but the Near East Relief was in charge of the transfer of the Greeks to Greece (Iatridis &
Compton, 1986, p.52).
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school culture and that at least since the time the College came to Greece, a devotion to

education rather than religious conversion has been the case. The Vice President

articulates the meaning of the best of Greek and American ideals as follows.

[The Greek ideals that permeate are], well, respect for tradition, respect for
classical education…There’s a respect for the Greek past. We say that,
but it also causes trouble. In other words, that’s a sort of boilerplate on the
best of American education, the best of Greek education. That takes a
little teasing out…[and] it causes a tension in the school. American
educational ideals, good or bad, are about giving kids a chance to think for
themselves, to discover knowledge for themselves, to do things by trial
and error, to work together in groups, to respect what they say even if
what they say is uninformed and immature and wrong, whatever” (Vice
President Interview, 10/23/2002).

The Vice President, who is more involved than the President in the day-to-day

activities of the school, recognizes that although the school promotes an international

attitude as described by the merging of Greek and American educational ideals, salient

tensions exists in practice. In other words, the company line to parents, donors and other

constituents of the school is that what distinguishes Anatolia is that it encapsulates the

best of Greek and American cultures, and this value is categorically embraced at the

administrative level. However, it can be a somewhat difficult idea to put into practice,

especially due to strict guidelines imposed by the Ministry of Education, and tends to

cause great strain at the classroom level. This tension between philosophy and practice is

expressed more ardently in comments from teachers below. For the V.P., a more

illustrative way to describe the school is by recognizing an ideal that helped establish

Anatolia years ago and still operates in subtle, powerful ways there.

[T]here is a spirit, I think, at Anatolia, in Greek it’s filalefthero—liberal, a

kind of liberal spirit. And there’s a kind of democratic spirit…And I think
that kind of culture of acceptance, of tolerance, of differences, of a kind of
liberal view of what a school should be, of what a school setting and

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 program should be, has survived…I see the way we make decisions
administratively. I see it the way teachers are with kids. I see the way
teachers talk when they complain about things. They feel free to do it.
[T]hat makes my life difficult sometimes but I like it” (ibid.).

Again, the complexity of balancing tradition and change is present. While the

Greek educational values involve upholding cultural tradition, embracing American

values is viewed as giving up tradition. For example, although the English language

program is not hostage to the Ministry, “we suffer because the system is such that our

English program can’t do what it ought to do in its last two years because kids are so

focused on preparing for Panhellenic exams that they don’t take English seriously

anymore” (ibid.). So, here’s a school that says, continue to take English seriously, and

the kids say no. All the incentives are for them to abandon English in the last two years,

11th and 12th grade, so they can concentrate on the subjects that matter for the university

entrance exams. So, it does not matter how good a program it is or how much freedom

they have. The real constraint is what happens to students’ attention when they get to be

a certain age. In reality, even the English program is profoundly influenced and affected

by the Greek system.

Practically, it is difficult—not impossible—for tradition and change to co-exist,

especially when one considers the rigid constraints imposed by the Greek Ministry of

Education and to a lesser extent the conservative climate of the city in which the school is

situated. Thus, whether the school is trying to get permission for parekliseis

(deviations) from the Ministry or promoting the International Baccalaureate program to

parents who are not willing to commit their children to going abroad for university, the

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administration acknowledges a constant area of constructive tension between maintaining

tradition/continuity and pursuing innovative educational change.26

The International Baccalaureate Program

The President’s third dimension characterizing Anatolia as an internationally

minded educational institution, the addition of the International Baccalaureate Diploma

program in 1998, is not immune to this tradition/change tension either. 27 The IB

Diploma is a two-year program—the last two years of lyceum at Anatolia—that prepares

students for entry into universities worldwide, predominantly in Western Europe and the

U.S. It is taught in English and follows a common international curriculum designed

around subject groups, which are discussed in more depth below. In the official IB

pamphlet distributed by the school, it describes Anatolia as a good fit for the IB program

because “Anatolia is an international institution with American as well as Greek roots; it

has always striven to promote a better understanding of others in a city with a long

history of being multicultural, tolerant and exciting” (IB Program, 2002-2003, p. 5).

However, the IB at the school talks evocatively about the presence of mistrust from

26
If a school wants to teach extra courses in a subject, it must obtain formal permission at the level of the
Minister of Education for what they call parekklisis, or deviations. The philosophy, as described to me by
Anatolia administration and faculty, is that a school teaching extra English, as Anatolia does, or other extra
courses is going to produce better students than the public system and therefore the public school students
are going to be disadvantaged. Thus, the system encourages schools to stick to the minimum requirements
mandated by the State by making negotiations for changes a difficult process. Once students opt for the IB
program, it basically shuts the door to any Greek university for them. So at 15 or 16, students must choose
to study abroad. All three administrators agreed that Thessaloniki is a conservative city. The I.B. Director
contends that the decision to study abroad is tough “especially for people in Thessaloniki. It’s not such a
big city. It’s not so internationally mobile or minded and people here are very conservative, even compared
to Athens. You’ll see that people are quite conservative here. You can see it in the way they vote as well”
(I.B. Director Interview, 10/31/02).
27
From this point forward, the abbreviation “IB” will be used to denote the International Baccalaureate
Diploma program.

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Anatolian parents for the globally oriented IB curriculum. However, it seems more

accurate to specify that the mistrust be for a curriculum in which Greek language and

history are not central components. In other words, the subtle yet significant difference is

a general unwillingness by many parents to accept an international education precisely

because it implies a subjugation of Greekness, a supposed loss of those uniquely national

objectives that produce good Greek citizens through a Greek curriculum.

On a national level, the Greek Ministry of Education responded to this perceived

“danger” by accepting the IB diploma as equivalent to the Greek apolitirio (diploma)28

and granting public schools the right to open IB departments, although no state school

has done so yet. In fact, the Director points out that “only private schools have done that

and only international schools really” (IB Director Interview, 10/31/2002). The

perceived mistrust of the IB program and the Ministry’s actions had two limiting effects

on Anatolia’s IB program. First, it gave the Ministry power over faculty and staff

appointments, which causes a “nightmare of bureaucracy” (ibid.) when hiring teachers

for subjects such as Spanish or psychology that are not consistent with state schools’

curricula. Second, the Ministry has asked IB programs in Greece to have Greek students

complete the Greek language and history courses that they would normally complete in

the last two years of public lyceum. As the Director candidly expresses:

So, the idea was that these are the very sensitive or nation-building
subjects that have to be taught even in fifth and sixth forms to Greek
students and that by opting to do the IB program in English, they would
miss out on history and Greek language. So, they have to take their
history and Greek language, which may be a way out or a defense against
an accusation of Greek students being brought up in a non-Greek way or
losing their Greekness once joining the IB, because you get that sort of
criticism (ibid.).
28
The Greek apolitirio is a high school diploma and it also grants entry into university.
118
 Anatolia’s response to these regulations has been simultaneously autonomous and

acquiescent. When speaking to those parents who fear that their child will lose her

Greekness by choosing the IB, the Director suggests that the easy way out is to tell them

not to worry. “The Ministry has provided for that. There is a guarantee that your kid will

still be a Greek once he finishes high school, because he will be taught those select

subjects” (ibid.). Critically, he recognizes that while it is convenient for him to use this

as an excuse to appease a particular view, it is incongruous to believe that one will lose

his Greekness by not taking part in Greek language and history courses in the last two

years of lyceum. Practically, he notes that IB students do not pay any attention when

they are taught Greek history because they only need it to pass. The grade does not count

for anything. And students also claim that it is considerably boring compared to the IB

history syllabus and they do not like the idea of doing both.

As an initial response, the school allowed Greek students the choice as to whether

they take Greek language and history in addition to their IB courses. For those opting out

of the Greek courses, they would receive the International Baccalaureate diploma, not the

Greek apolitirio. For those opting to take the Greek courses, they would receive both

diplomas provided they pass those two subjects of the Panhellenic examinations. Not

surprising based on the Director’s comments, when given the choice most students opted

not to take the Greek courses. This caused a great deal of anxiety because “the school did

not like the idea of being pinpointed as a school which offers its students the alternative

NOT to be Greek, a way out of Greekness” (ibid.). In the end, the school acquiesced to

the cultural pressure and made the decision that the two additional Greek courses,

language and history, be compulsory for all Greek students in the IB program. The only

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exceptions were for those students with dual nationality, in which case they continued to

be given the choice by the College.

From the perspective of the administration, Anatolia is clearly described as an

internationally minded educational institution that struggles to uphold its democratic

spirit in a cultural and educational climate that at times welcomes and at times resists the

idea of change and innovation. As the President states in his report,

In the high school, a long and distinguished history is at once its greatest
asset and a brake on change. Innovation there resembles an ocean liner
changing course and involves labyrinthine government regulations and
multiple constituencies, often on relatively minor issues (President’s
Report, 2002, p.4).

I now turn to the classroom level and provide a detailed comparison of history

education in the Greek lyceum and International Baccalaureate programs at Anatolia

College. While the purpose of the previous section was the identification from the

executive level of the collective ethos of the school as an internationally minded

institution, the focus of the proceeding section narrows to the milieu of the history

classroom. The purpose is to identify and describe a conceptual understanding of

historical consciousness among students as they negotiate two ways of knowing that are

in practice in history classes at the College.

CONTRASTING APPROACHES TO HISTORY EDUCATION

In the last two years of lyceum, there are two options for students at Anatolia

College. They may choose to remain in the Greek lyceum, whose curriculum is set by the

Greek Ministry of Education, or they may choose to pursue to the International

Baccalaureate program, whose curriculum is designed by a non-profit educational

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institution, the IBO, headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland.29 The history curricula in

these programs are vastly disparate in terms of purpose, content and methods and the

following vignettes, constructed from empirical classroom observations at the College

and interviews with the teachers and students in the lyceum and IB programs respectively

are presented as an introduction to each program. The topics discussed, comments

portrayed by students and teachers, and general flow of activity comprising each

classroom depiction is taken directly from these sources. The choice to discern these

particular observations was made on the determination, after the completion of the

fieldwork, that each is a representative sample of its particular division. Utilizing the

representative character of the two vignettes, then, specific distinctions are made between

the purpose, content and methods of history education in the two school divisions,

between students’ negotiation of official and critical knowledge and likewise, patterns for

understanding historical consciousness among them are presented. Three concepts

central to this comparison, official knowledge, critical knowledge and historical

consciousness, are defined at the outset. 30

Three Central Concepts

Official knowledge refers to “educational knowledge which the state constructs

and distributes in educational institutions” (Bernstein, 2000, p. 65). It is knowledge

29
For matters of convenience, the term “lyceum” will be used to denote the Greek lyceum from this point
forward. However, it is important to remember that both the regular Greek lyceum and International
Baccalaureate are part of the overall lyceum of Anatolia College.
30
While I am organizing my discussion around defined conceptions of official knowledge, critical
knowledge and historical consciousness, I recognize that there are not definitive theories of or common sets
of agreed-upon dimensions in which to describe and analyze them. However, the definitions I present here
correspond best for this study.

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selected, organized and valued by the state, reflected in detailed official syllabi and

corresponding textbooks, and expected to construct in teachers and students particularly

singular perspectives and attitudes. This type of knowledge is often declared as the

undisputed truth and presented as the legitimate knowledge for transmission to future

generations of students (Apple, 2000). Here, a selective approach operates whereby the

formal corpus of school knowledge is bound by the centrality and control of the state.

Michael Apple, in Official Knowledge: Democratic Education in a Conservative Age,

equates the selection of official knowledge in schools with “another area of the cultural

apparatus of a society, the press” (ibid, p. 62). In the same way the press chooses which

information to be presented and/or omitted, so do ministries of education in many state

governments make similar choices for schools. Ultimately, the valuing and

legitimization of knowledge is understood as a responsibility of the state. Likewise,

Apple (2000) explains that, ‘the “cultural capital” declared to be official knowledge is

compromised knowledge, i.e., filtered through a complex set of political screens and

decisions before it gets to be declared legitimate. This affects what knowledge is selected

and what the selected knowledge looks like as it is transformed into something that will

be taught to students in schools” (ibid). In this approach, the state acts as a

“recontextualizing agent,” as Basil Bernstein would call it, in a process to reproduce, not

produce, “knowledge for everyone” (Apple, 2000, p. 64-65; Bernstein, 2000).

In contrast to official knowledge’s preoccupation with explicitly defined sets of

information, a critical knowledge approach emphasizes processes over a comprehensive

body of knowledge. This type of knowledge refers to processes whereby schools present

information not as decisively legitimized and true, but as perspectives to be analyzed and

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interpreted. It is a concept which views knowledge as contestable, dynamic and thought

provoking. Curricular content, i.e., information presented in schools, is viewed as a

vehicle for familiarizing students with and developing in them abilities for critical

thinking, constructive inquiry and multiperspectivity. Critical knowledge does not view

content (e.g., the events comprising the Greek War of Independence) as unimportant.

Rather, it is a way for students to discover knowledge for themselves (e.g., sources about

the Greek War of Independence are not self-explanatory and have meaning in certain

contexts) and encourages them to become active, compassionate and lifelong learners

who understand that other people, with their differences, can also be right. Thus, there is

an orientation beyond the local, beyond the nation-state in the concept of critical

knowledge. Importantly, critical knowledge processes take into account that evaluating

the full range of possible perspectives is impossible and schools, then, must make choices

about what, whose, and how knowledge is presented, too. Unlike official knowledge,

however, they are not taken-for-granted choices. In other words, they depend upon issues

such as nationality, religion, social status, gender, politics and economics and a critical

knowledge approach will include the awareness and a bias of these relationships to the

choices made.

The negotiation of official and critical knowledge, specifically in patterns of

historical thinking, is the main theme in the analysis that follows. These two types of

knowledge play a reciprocal role in the development of historical consciousness among

students in the College. However, the term historical consciousness covers a complex

concept that is difficult to define. The developers of the Youth and History survey take a

useful approach to the concept and likewise, it is the approach in which I situate this

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study. In the approach, exploring historical consciousness implies examining three

elements expressed by students: (1) interpretations of the past, (2) perceptions of the

present and (3) expectations for the future. Also, and not least, it implies examining the

possible relationship among the three elements (Nielsen, 1997, p. A402). As such,

historical consciousness is understood as a form of self-positioning and a part of

individual and collective identity, having a bearing on values and interests, and

influencing attitudes and actions. From this perspective, historical consciousness is

explored in this project as a conceptual framework by which students understand Greek

and European culture over time and leads to a discussion of how it relates to trends

towards a united European historical consciousness, counter-trends in which the

idiosyncrasies of national and cultural traditions work against such a course of integration

(Dragonas & Frangoudaki, 2000, p. 230) and how these trends may be conceptualized as

cultural identities among Greek students.

Vignette I: Portrait of a Lesson

I walk into the 12th grade history classroom and an icon of the Virgin and Child

hangs above the chalkboard. I glance around the room and observe that each student has

a history textbook, Themata tis Neoellinikis Istorias (Themes in Modern Greek History),

on his or her desk. I notice a student flipping through the pages and methodically

crossing out whole sections, so I approach him and inquire about his actions. He informs

me that he is marking out the sections that are not on the Panhellenic examinations this

year to avoid accidentally studying them. I note the interesting comment and take a seat

in the back of the classroom. The teacher begins the class by asking students to turn to a

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page in the history textbook and introduces the topic: Today we are going to discuss

philhellenic society in the early 19th century. She proceeds by giving a short lecture that

deviates little from the textbook section on the same theme. Meanwhile, a few students

take notes in the margins of their books while others apathetically gaze around the room.

The aforementioned student continues his ‘exam preparations.’

After the lecture, the teacher asks a student to find a map from another room. He

returns with a large map, hangs it on the wall and the teacher asks, Where is

Messolonghi? Who can point out Samos? How about Chios? Students appear more

interested when the discussion turns to Greek geography and the teacher attentively takes

advantage of this interest by closing her textbook and asking: How many of you are

familiar with the Delacroix painting of the massacre at Chios? What does this painting

by a French artist, not a Greek one, tell us? Most students acknowledge their familiarity

with the painting and a discussion filled with opinions and personal experiences ensues.

Students’ comments include: “The painting has a lot of bloody bodies and I think this

showed the rest of the world how badly the Greeks were being treated.” “I saw it when

we went to Paris and I remember thinking that the Europeans had the same desire as the

Greeks. They wanted us to be free and they were telling it through art.” “I think it

reminds us that we should help the people who are poorer and have less strength in the

world.” “My dad’s family is from Chios and he told me the Greeks sent newspapers

abroad in English to tell the Europeans and Americans what was happening to them

there.”

After this lively student-led discussion, the teacher tells the class in a whispered

tone: You have brought up many important ideas about ‘to pnevma’ (the spirit) of

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philhellenism. However, I want you to forget what we just talked about. In other words,

I want you to put that information in a different place now. I don’t want you to confuse

these ideas with the information that you must learn. The students seem not to be

puzzled by her whispered comments and the focus returns to information in the textbook.

The teacher closes the class with a summary of the textbook’s main idea: This is what you

should remember from today. There were two main reasons for philhellenic support

during the early 19th century: one, empathy for a struggling Greek people and two, an

admiration for Greek culture due to the revival of classical Greek thought in Europe.

(Form 6 Greek Lyceum History Observation, 10/16/2002).

Describing School History in the Greek Lyceum

In Vignette I, generated from a Form 6 (12th grade) Greek lyceum history class at

Anatolia, there is a close adherence to the history textbook and an unequivocal exam-

driven motive present in the lesson. Putting aside the discussion of the Delacroix

painting for a moment—that portion of the lesson students were told to forget—the

lesson may be described as linear, fact-driven and explanatory rather than exploratory,

especially reflecting the main goals of the national history curriculum. This curriculum,

outlined by one of Anatolia’s lyceum deans, follows a linear and chronological structure

and is designated as official history. Beginning in Form 4 (10th grade), it cover the

Bronze, Archaic and Classical periods and concludes with the Roman period in Greece

up to 146 B.C.31 In Form 5, students sit for university entrance examinations, known as

31
The latter topic was only added in the 2002-2003 academic year.

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the Panhellenic examinations.32 The dean acknowledges that history is one of the nine

subjects tested and that “it [the curriculum] is very rigidly set and teachers do not have

much flexibility to stray from the textbook” (Greek Lyceum Dean Interview, 9/24/2002).

This declaration is confirmed in nearly every faculty interview conducted for this

research project and is documented throughout the analysis. In this year, the curriculum

covers the Byzantine era, French Revolution, Enlightenment, Industrial Revolution in

Europe, and Greece before the 1821 Revolution. Finally, in Form 6 students are tested

again for university entrance on the material covered in this last year of lyceum. As in

the previous year, the curriculum consists of a rigid set of material derived directly from

the textbook. Topics include the Greek Revolution, political organizations after the

Revolution, the birth of the Greek nation, Eleftherios Velizelos and nation-building, the

Balkan Wars and the Asia Minor incident.33 The fact that Anatolia College is a private

school makes no difference in curricular flexibility. It must follow Ministry requirements

because the College awards the Greek apolitirio. As a result, the history curriculum is

exactly the same as in the public schools. This history syllabus “reflects the views held

by the educational authorities on what is historically important or unimportant in the

nation’s past; as such, it documents the choices, suppressions, omissions, and emphases

that constitute official history” (Avdela, 2000, p. 240).

32
As discussed in the education reform section of the literature review, the system is in the process of
change. As a result, the 2004-2005 academic year is the last year in which Panhellenic examinations will
be held in Form 5. Beginning in the 2005-2006 year, they will only be given to students in Form 6, the last
year of lyceum. Additionally, students will be tested on six subjects rather than nine.
33
It is interesting to note that the dean pointed out to me the various words one may use to describe the
Asia Minor incident in 1922. He explained that one may say “catastrophe,” “incident,” campaign” or
“tragedy” in referring to it. This attitude reflects a more impartial judgment of this historically emotional
event.
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 The main problem with this orientation to history, according to Anatolia’s IB

Director, a former teacher in the lyceum and a former dean of the gymnasium, is that “the

Greek system did have and still does have the idea of a sort of spiral curriculum in which

you simply revisit the same areas of the same periods more or less, not really to develop

new skills, but just to go into more detail” (IB Director Interview, 10/31/2002). This

approach places emphasis on the past as the marker of time and leaves little room for

discussion and debate. Defined by official history, students are taught to view Hellenism

as an unalterable and unified entity, independent of time, and existing outside of and

beyond historical change.

The teacher in this vignette reveals in our interview that she feels the pressure to

disseminate the detailed information outlined in the Form 6 curriculum and she does so in

a conscientious manner.34 To neglect this responsibility would be a disservice to her

students under the current educational system. As she expresses, “The goals for the

students are basically to pass the test. But the goals that are set by the Ministry of

Education are somewhat different. Of course, there’s a big hypocrisy in that. As for the

class itself and my work in it, I try to do my best in those terms that are determined by

someone else” (Faculty Interview, 11/1/2002). She goes on to reveal that it is a difficult

position to teach in the last two years of Greek lyceum and explains that teachers always

have to remember that their students must memorize the textbook in order to succeed on

their examinations. “Yet, if I just try to make the children memorize, for me, it’s a

failure” (Faculty Interview, 11/1/2002). Other colleagues express similar frustrations as

34
Philologue is a term that denotes a person in Greece with general university training in the humanities
(history, classics, language). The history teachers at Anatolia are philologues. They can teach many
different humanistic courses, and the philologues constitute the largest body of teachers in the school.
128
teachers in the lyceum. “It is a kind of experience—how to be free and also to prepare

your students for examinations. It’s a kind of talent. We have to have the understanding

that we are to be slaves and free in a way, let’s say. And it’s very difficult” (Faculty

Interview, 11/7/2002) and “The difficulty is that when the children are young

[gymnasium], they are not so ready to hear and to understand. So the teachers are free

but the students are very young. And when the student older [lyceum] and ready to hear

and to understand and to create, they have just to prepare for the Panhellenic

examinations” (Faculty Interview 11/7/2002). And the Vice President of the school

acknowledges the teachers’ frustrations when he describes teaching as “a small freedom

within a larger straightjacket” (Vice President Interview, 10/23/2002). Anatolia history

teachers are well aware that they work within a system that does not trust its teachers.

Despite these conditions, these teachers overtly distinguish for their students

between the type of information that the textbook presents, or official knowledge, and a

different type of knowledge evolving from discussions such as that of the Delacroix

painting, i.e., critical, interpretative, creative, analytical knowledge. In the end, these

teachers always return to the textbook so that students are left with the awareness that the

explicit goal is the memorization of information from the history textbook. Nevertheless,

and perhaps more importantly, the experiences of Delacroix-like discussions remain in

their memories. In this context, Anatolia students learn to accept the memorization of

official knowledge as a way of succeeding in the system. At the same time, the

opportunities given to them by their teachers for critical evaluation implicitly teaches

them that historical knowledge is meaningful, relevant to their lives, and fundamental to

the development of their own supportable and defendable opinions.

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 For instance, in one group interview with Form 5 students, the awareness that two

forms of knowledge are operating in the classroom is expressed transparently. One

student unaffectedly states, “Sometimes our own teachers tell us—do not understand that,

just learn it. Sometimes you have to do that even if it’s bad” (Form 5 Student Interview,

11/8/2002). Similarly, his classmate negotiates official and critical knowledge familiarly

when she says,

There is a lot of pressure to go through all the material that we have to

learn for the exams and so we can’t really be interested in history or try to
find doubt, to search. We have to learn what is written in the book. But
we know that many historical books are quite subjective because when
two historians are studying the same period or the same event, they might
understand two different versions, so we can’t really be sure what really
happened. Of course, we know that details are altered by historians
according to their point of view. I mean, from our nature people are
subjective. They are not objective (ibid.).

Although these students apply the term “learn” in the context of preparing for rote

examinations, their comments convey an understanding of the difference between

memorizing information for a test and learning to employ information in a critical way.

Their teachers are also aware of the difference. As one Anatolia philologue summarizes,

“…students are tested on the Form 5 and 6 history curricula so they must simply

memorize, not learn it” (Faculty Interview, 9/26/2002). However, an awareness of

differences between official and critical knowledge does not lead these students to

challenge ethnocentric interpretations of the past. Instead, evidence presented throughout

the chapter suggests that attitudes among the majority of lyceum students in their last two

years reflect an understanding of history that conforms to the expectations of the

program, i.e., a historical consciousness wherein Greek history is viewed as an

uninterrupted historical continuity since antiquity, the conservation of Greek cultural

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characteristics is of great importance, and great cultural homogeneity is promoted

(Avdela, 1997; 2000). Thus, classroom experiences wherein memorization over analysis,

regurgitation over critical thinking, and involuntary acceptance over constructive inquiry

are dominant reflect static orientations to historical consciousness. This orientation is

implied by presentations of official knowledge, despite the implicit processes of critical

knowledge present in their classrooms. Students and teachers in the IB program also

recognize these two ways of knowing. However, as illustrated in the second vignette,

classroom experiences and student historical consciousness are slightly different from

those in the Greek lyceum.

Vignette II: A Room with a View

Seven students sit around a small classroom in random order chatting with one

another while the teacher writes the following question on the chalkboard: How is a

strong economy created? The history class begins. He turns to his students and says,

The English economist John Maynard Keynes once argued that the Prussian success in

uniting Germany was based not on “blood and iron” but on “coal and iron.” How do

you understand this phrase? How far do you agree with Keynes’ statement? Together,

the class discusses a range of ideas and ultimately makes the distinction between how an

economy is created and what an economy achieves. The teacher suggests that today they

focus on the question written on the board and students actively pose possible answers for

it. They include: “you must have autonomy to have a strong economy,” “countries who

have strong ones usually have control over others,” “I think they always have a strong

military,” “I believe that it means pursuing an aggressive foreign policy.” The teacher

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gives constructive feedback for students’ answers and then asks them to consider the

United States as an example.

He says, Let’s think about the U.S. Why is it the most powerful force in the

world? A thoughtful, critical discussion ensues between the students and teacher. As

students sway off-course by turning to a critique of U.S. foreign policy, the teacher brings

them back on topic by saying, I’m not asking you to be cynical. I just want you to

question what you read and what you think. You should always ask yourself, ‘What

else?’ With the teacher’s help, the students realize additional conditions for creating a

strong economy. They include: “it seems that the international situation must be

favorable for pursuing one’s economic policy,” and “your country must be behind you, I

mean, the government needs popular support for the development of a strong economy.”

During the discussion, one student makes a controversial comment about the German

economy and the teacher asks, Are there any objections to Yianni’s statement? Several

students take the opportunity to respond constructively to Yianni’s opinion. An involved

debate between three students takes up the remainder of the class period. The teacher

closes the discussion by telling students, Try to expand your historical vision and use our

discussion today as a framework for thinking about other historical topics that we will

discuss. (IB2 Observation, 11/06/2002).

The IB Way to School History

The developers of the IB curriculum believe that the pace at which knowledge

changes in contemporary society means that it is insufficient for secondary schools to

employ an encyclopedic approach to education. Rather than simply disseminate

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information, the school has to equip students with the ability to learn how to learn and to

evaluate information critically (IB Pamphlet, 2002-2003, p. 3). Vignette II, generated

from a second-year International Baccalaureate history class (12th grade), reflects a very

different classroom experience than that of the first vignette. The questions posed by the

teacher invite students to construct meaning, challenge information, formulate opinions

and support one’s convictions. He provides the context for learning how to learn and for

evaluating information critically and his questions are exemplary to the task: How do you

understand this phrase? How far do you agree with Keynes’ statement? Let’s think about

the U.S. Why is it the most powerful force in the world? I’m not asking you to be cynical.

I just want you to question what you read and what you think. You should always ask

yourself, ‘What else?’ Are there any objections to Yianni’s statement? As a whole, this

history lesson may be described as comparative, critical and evaluative, and it noticeably

attempts to adhere to the general goals stated in the IB literature and reflected in the

curriculum structure.

The overall organization of the International Baccalaureate curriculum is that of a

hexagon with six academic areas surrounding a core of three requirements. 35 The domain

35
At Anatolia, IB students choose one subject from each of the following six academic areas: Group 1:
First Language of the student (Greek or English), Group 2: Second Modern Language (English, French,
Spanish, Italian or German), Group 3: Individuals and Societies (history, economics, psychology), Group 4:
Experimental Sciences (biology, chemistry, physics), Group 5: Mathematics, and Group 6: Arts and
Electives (visual arts, music, theatre arts). In addition, all students must complete the three core
requirements: Theory of Knowledge (a weekly seminar reflecting on different domains of knowledge), the
Extended Essay (a 4000-word research essay to be completed during the 2-year study period), and the
Creative Action Service Program (weekly participation in activities related to artistic expression, sports,
and/or community service). A sample of Extended Essay topics from Anatolia students that involve
historical investigation include: women in Nazi Germany, gladiators and gladatorial culture in
contemporary America as expressed through a comparison of Roman gladiators and wrestlers in the U.S.,
the Greek middle class in Istanbul at the turn of the century, and themes of representation in Schindler’s
List and Life is Beautiful.
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of history is located primarily in academic area entitled “Individuals and Societies,” and

secondarily in the “Theory of Knowledge” and “Extended Essay” requirements. In

contrast to the lyceum history curriculum determined by the Greek Ministry of

Education, the IB structure is non-linear, non-chronological and thematically oriented.

One IB history teacher at Anatolia describes the IB program as “a normal history

program” (Faculty Interview, 10/30/2002). By this, she means that “it incorporates

everyone and sees the leaks, the differences, the similarities, the comparisons, the

contrasts…[and] it puts history in a wider context…It gives kids a perspective that there

was nothing happening in isolation, whereas the Greek program has lots and lots and lots

of focus on the Greek stuff” (ibid.). She believes that Greeks have a narrower view of

history because the Ministry of Education imposes it on them. She says, “I think the

inability to accept that there are other views is dangerous and it’s not history as far as I’m

concerned. I mean, they’re learning propaganda ” (ibid.).

As demonstrated in the second classroom vignette and supported by the curricular

structure of the IB program, the use of critical knowledge is an explicit component of the

IB history classroom at Anatolia. Students in their second year of IB expect that

knowledge is contestable and truth claims about the past are not free of bias or

interpretation, a critical knowledge approach to history. It is evident in their classroom

interactions and dialogues. However, one wonders whether these students learn to

negotiate critical knowledge in the IB classroom or did they come in with, or choose this

program precisely because they already have this orientation to and expectation for

knowledge. It is suggested here that the answer can be both of these things. With regard

to the former, empirical evidence supports the declaration that IB teachers at Anatolia

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guide students in developing and negotiating critical knowledge skills by asking them to

actively construct knowledge rather than passively accept information they encounter.

Two relevant examples related to library use and evaluation of sources respectively

support this claim.

First, the centrality of the library varies considerably between lyceum and IB

curricula. As the President of the College states, “The trouble with Greek secondary

education is that libraries are irrelevant to it” (Interview, 2/18/2003). This is confirmed

when one visits one of the two highly-advanced libraries on campus only to find students

studying at a table or writing emails on the computer rather than searching the stacks for

resources. When one looks at the names in books that have been checked out, it is almost

always an IB student. The general attitude in Greek education is that research projects

that utilize the library take too much time and are mostly avoided. Thus, the idea of an

essay for the lyceum student is “cutting and pasting articles or pieces from

encyclopedias” (IB Director Interview, 10/31/2002). These students are not taught to use

the library. In contrast, all IB history assignments require use of the library. They are

oriented toward the evaluation of multiple sources, thereby acquiring skills for research

and attitudes about learning that previously they were not taught.

A second example supporting the claim that Anatolia’s IB program teaches

students to approach history as critical knowledge requires a comparison of first and

second year students in the program. Both IB teachers express that there is a lack of

critical engagement in students during their first year of the IB program yet a marked

changes occurs during their second year. Because the structure is such that these teachers

follow their students from first to second year, they gain privileged insight into each

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student’s progress. They describe students in the first year IB as consumers of

knowledge, as if knowledge is ready-made, and they reproduce it but do not engage in it

(Faculty Interview, 10/30/2002). This assessment is not surprising when considering the

Greek system from which these students come. However, by the end of the second year,

teachers describe the same students as almost at the other end of the spectrum with regard

to knowledge orientation. After dealing with the raw material of primary source

documents, the teachers observe that students learn to “critically assess them” (ibid.).

Moreover, they seem to go beyond to become very suspicious of sources. One teachers

explains it as follows:

The thing I encountered with these kids…is that they become extremely
postmodern. They think everything is false…They always tend to see
conspiracies, always. This is a problem for the second year students.
They may say that the source is biased because the author is German. I
say so what, Karl Marx was German, but he was not for German
nationalism. They have a difficulty to go beyond this kind of, I name it
subject position, but it’s not. They don’t know anything about Judith
Butler, but it’s this, that everybody has his or her own point of view and
every point of view is absolutely legitimate (ibid.).

In this respect, students are engaging with very important issues in the classroom.

Their teachers are forcing them to think differently and variously about knowledge, i.e.,

they seem to be developing a historical consciousness wherein interpretations of the past

are varied and understandings of the present and expectations for the future are based on

multiple sources and a multiplicity of views. These students experience school history

wherein they learn how to develop reading skills, how to write a scholarly piece of work,

how to structure a paragraph and footnote, they learn how to argue, how to present their

opinions, how to research (ibid.). All of these things are indispensable to them and

appear to have a bearing on the development of their historical consciousness. Thus, IB

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students learn how to learn because the program makes critical knowledge explicit.

However, considering only this perspective puts the analysis at risks of romanticizing the

IB as a wholly inspiring program that lacks problems and produces better critical thinkers

than its counterpart in the Greek lyceum. Thus, it is necessary to address the second

answer to this inquiry. Simply stated, while some students learn to negotiate critical

knowledge in the IB classroom, as evidenced above, others appear to come equipped with

these skills and have chosen the program precisely because they already possess the skills

associated with critical knowledge.

For example, Giorgos, a first-year student in the IB program at Anatolia, believes

that Greeks have a problem with open-mindedness and blames the educational system for

this cultural ailment. He says “it promotes close-mindedness and parochialism within

children” (Student Interview, 3/1/2004) and supports his idea with a personal experience.

Prior to joining the IB program, he attended a Greek public school. One day, his history

class was discussing the Greek War of Independence and they were discussing, from the

textbook, that the Church supported the independence movement. Giorgos disagreed

with the book and his teacher, expressing his belief that the Church was fearful of losing

the power it had over its Orthodox citizens if independence was achieved. An argument

ensued wherein Giorgos refused to accept uncritically the opinion written in the book and

the teacher refused to accept Giorgos’ pejorative opinion. As a result of his

insubordination to “state-imposed official history,” as he put it, he was suspended from

school for several days (ibid.).

The IB teacher teaching Giorgos believes that these students choose the IB

program, as Giorgos did, because they are eager for something different. For this teacher,

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“history creates in the student a good critical sense and it equips the student with

excellent skills to do anything” (I.B. Faculty Interview, 10/30/2002). This is her job as a

historian and history teacher in the IB. Thus, she feels strongly that the students who do

choose the IB path are “self-selecting” and have already made up their minds. “The

difference is that our students are prepared to see something different because they’ve

come in expecting something different. Otherwise, they’d stay in the regular program”

(ibid.). Thus, it takes a student like Giorgos to choose the IB program, because he knows

that it will be a place for him to develop his critical thinking skills.

Another example supports the same idea. As stated earlier, it is compulsory that

IB students at Anatolia take Greek history to earn the Greek apolitirio. Assigned to this

Greek history course during the 2001-2002 year, an IB history teacher decided to teach it

in the IB way. He did so because he felt that a potential danger of the IB, due to an

inescapable comparison, was the rejection of the Greek curriculum and Greek system of

education by students. He feared they might begin to view the IB program, which is

developed and administered in Switzerland, from the perspective of “Western Europe

coming to us, the natives, the indigenous and showing us the true, the enlightened

education” (I.B. Faculty Interview, 10/30/2002). However, the reaction from first-year

IB students to his methods was wholly antagonistic.

They were disturbed that they were doing good histories of Greece in the IB way.

These students have a great deal of experience with the straightforward, explanatory

methods of the Greek curriculum and seemingly want to keep it in its place. For these

students, extending the IB way into the Greek curriculum also puts the IB curriculum in

danger of being infiltrated by the Greek way. While they understand the former as

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beneficial, albeit difficult for them to place the idea of learning Greek history in the same

way that history is taught in IB, it is the latter that they reject entirely (ibid.). Talking with

several IB boarding students in the dormitory one evening, I learned that, indeed, these

students chose the IB program with express purposes: “in IB students are more

responsible for their learning,” “you see more perspectives and are asked to see them

differently and this is what I could not do in my other classes” and “you’re definitely

more involved and you’re able to express your point of view on certain issues here” (IB

Student Group Interview, 11/1/2002). Their comments strongly suggest that these

students chose the IB program precisely for a different learning experience and reflect an

already present understanding that learning involves more than the acceptance of official

knowledge.

Taken together, it may be argued that Anatolia’s IB program makes critical

knowledge explicit by teaching students to be responsible for their learning, encouraging

them to use multiple sources, helping them deal with interpretations more than facts, and

forcing them to think critically on issues. Similarly, it may be argued that the same

program attracts students who already possess these skills and, thus, choose it because

their development is stifled in the Greek system. Based on empirical evidence provided

in this study, it seems that both are appropriately acceptable answers to the inquiry.

Whether students learn to negotiate critical knowledge in the IB classroom or choose the

program because they already have this orientation to and expectation for knowledge,

they know that it is an educational environment wherein they may take responsibility for

their education rather than accept a passive system that suppresses critical knowledge.

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 Ultimately, what does a comparison of the history programs in Anatolia’s lyceum

and International Baccalaureate achieve? Primarily, it reveals that official and critical

knowledge play important, yet different roles in the way historical knowledge is

presented to students in the two programs at Anatolia. Specifically, while official

knowledge is the explicit goal of the curriculum in the lyceum, critical knowledge is

operating implicitly on a significant and transparent level. Thus, students are learning to

negotiate both forms of knowledge in the classroom. They learn to accept, perhaps

necessarily uncritically, official knowledge as a way of succeeding in the educational

system. At the same time, teachers provide them with opportunities to engage in critical

knowledge as a way of learning how to learn. Despite this, the majority of lyceum

students are oriented towards history as official knowledge, described by the educational

authorities, as it is presented to them in the classroom. In contrast, critical knowledge is

central and explicitly negotiated in the IB classroom, while official knowledge is

deliberately rejected. These students have only to accept without consideration official

knowledge in one class, Greek history, and have the uncommon luxury of placing it on

the margin of the curriculum. While it is misguided to say that only in the IB are students

able to negotiate critical knowledge since both programs offer opportunities, albeit

differently, for the development of this form of knowledge, students in the IB have more

opportunities for and express a greater awareness of the interconnectedness between the

relativity of historical knowledge, the conflict of interpretations, and the social demand

and political use of the past for reasons of representation (Pok, Rusen & Scherrer, 2002).

One IB history teacher describes it as follows:

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 It takes a long time to make them think differently about this kind of
material, but it’s the only way. When they come to the program, they act
like a taxi driver. Everybody’s lying. Nobody’s telling the truth. The
government’s lying [and] everybody’s the same. So this kind of extreme
leveling…this lack of evaluation, lack of differentiating…they don’t have
at first because of the way Greek society works. But the IB program is a
very good way to go beyond that and they do learn how to go beyond that
here (I.B. Faculty Interview, 10/30/ 2002).

HISTORICAL CONSCIOUSNESS: STUDENTS’ PERSPECTIVES

In this final section, I examine students’ perceptions of their history classes by

analyzing responses to several questions from a questionnaire prepared for this project

and administered to a random sample of students from both the lyceum and IB. These

results are worthy of note because they suggest that students’ perceptions of what goes on

in their history classes vary between the lyceum and International Baccalaureate.

What Happens in History Classes?

In the student questionnaire administered for the study (Appendix A), question

sixteen asks students what usually happens in their history classes at Anatolia and

provides nine sub-categories for consideration. Student responses from this question,

illustrated below as mean scores in Figure 5.1, provide a general picture of their

perceptions of what goes on in history classes at Anatolia. Responses vary little in most

categories. The significant differences are from sub-categories asking about library

research and the memorization of facts. Interestingly, within these sub-categories both

groups of students express generally similar attitudes reflected in mean scores that are

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 negative for library research (GL=1.43, IB=2.35) and positive for memorization of facts

(GL=4.61, IB=3.35).36

5
16. What usually happens in your history classes at Anatolia?
4.5
1=very seldom, 2=seldom, 3=sometimes, 4=often, 5=very often
4

3.5
a. We listen to teachers’ stories about the past
b. We are informed of what is good or bad, right or wrong in history
3
c. We discuss different interpretations of what happened in the past
Mean Value

2.5 d. We study historical sources, e.g. documents, maps, pictures

2
(outside the textbook)
e. We retell and reinterpret history ourselves in discussions and
1.5
writing assignments
1
f. We watch historical videos and films
0.5 g. We do research projects by using sources in the library
0
h. We visit museums and historical sites
A B C D E
Sub-category
F G H I
i. We memorize facts about history
Regular Lyceum International Baccalaureate

Figure 5.1: Anatolia History Classes Graph

From the data, it appears that both groups of students, notwithstanding library

research and fact memorization, perceive themselves as doing the same kinds of work in

their history classes despite empirical evidence that they are in very different programs.

In the confines of this close-ended question, the areas emphasized in the sub-categories

for library use and fact memorization are distinguished as most different for them.

Statistically, 92% of lyceum students surveyed responded seldom or very seldom to the

sub-category related to library research compared to 50% of IB students. The difference

reflects a conspicuous difference between the respective history programs. A similar

discrepancy appears in the sub-category referring to the memorization of facts. From this

36
The mean score of 3.00 is understood as the defining separation between positive and negative
attitudinal responses for all questions on the questionnaire. Also, the mean value range for all questions on
the questionnaire is 0-5.

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 question, 97% of lyceum students surveyed and 50% of IB students believe that they

memorize facts about history often or very often. The fact that students perceive their

history classes in similar ways is an interesting quandary.

Which Historical Methods Would You Use?

In another question, both student groups were asked which historical methods

they would like to employ if they were deciding how to teach history. Students’

responses to this close-ended question, illustrated in Figure 5.2, also are generally similar.

However, two margins are notable.

17. If you could decide what to teach in your history classes at

5
Anatolia, how important would these HISTORICAL METHODS be
4.5 to you? In other words, how would you like to learn history?
4
1 = very little, 2 = little, 3 = some, 4 = much, 5 = very much
a. To seek knowledge about the main facts in history
3.5
b. To morally judge historical events according to the standards of
3
human and civil rights
Mean Value

2.5 c. To compare different perspectives of the same events

2
d. To understand the behaviors of past persons by reconstructing the
special situations and contemporary thoughts of the period when
1.5
they lived
1
e. To use history to explain the situations in the world today and to
0.5 find out the tendencies of change
0
f. To learn to acknowledge the traditions, characteristics, and values of
A B C D
Sub-category
E F G
the Greek nation
Regular Lyceum International Baccalaureate
g. To examine how ancient Greece influences modern societies

Figure 5.2: Historical Methods Graph

First, the sub-category in which IB students feel most positive, and the only one in

which they surpass lyceum students, is that related to the use of comparative perspectives

in history (sub-category c). Here, the mean score for IB respondents is 4.19 compared to

3.66 for lyceum students. While both mean scores reflect positive attitudes for the use of

multiple perspectives, it is moderately higher for IB students. It is difficult to suggest

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salient reasons for this difference other than to be reminded that IB students are explicitly

more familiar with this method of historical investigation. The same rationale may

explain why the sub-category in which lyceum students feel most positive is that of

seeking knowledge about the main facts in history (sub-category a). Indeed, empirical

evidence from this project has established that these methods are explicitly practiced in

their respective programs. Thus, it may be suggested with equal worth that lyceum

students value the comparison of perspective only slightly less than IB students value the

search for facts in history and vice versa.

A second notable margin in this question recognizes a marked difference in

attitude towards Greek culture (sub-category f) and the importance of ancient Greece on

modern societies (sub-category g). It is in these last two sub-categories where the

greatest difference in attitude between the student groups is found. In both sub-

categories, lyceum students respond positively (3.71 and 3.66 respectively) while IB

students respond negatively (2.90 and 2.95 respectively). Based on the data, IB students

show less interest and place less emphasis on the role of Greek history and culture in the

their history education. This suggests that historical consciousness among the two groups

of students differs greatly in terms of emphasis and interest in the Greek nation and

nation-state, as interpreted in the past and its role in the present and future. This

difference is further explored and exemplified in the next chapter.

The analysis so far has been entirely concerned with different pedagogical

approaches to history at Anatolia College and their relationship to the development of

student historical consciousness. On the whole, students’ experience with and

negotiation of official and critical knowledge appear to have some bearing on how they

144
view the past, and thus how they understand the present. The distinct ways in which

history is approached in the lyceum and IB programs is reflected in equally distinct

developments of historical consciousness among these high school students. Generally,

the majority of Greek lyceum students view history more as a stable, organic and

established representation of knowledge whereas IB students work with historical

presentations more as dynamic, constructed and perspectival knowledge. This does not

mean to imply that the student groups represent two different, homogeneous and

unrelated sets with regard to historical consciousness. Indeed, this is not the case and

there are examples of students representing the respective minority view within each

group as well as a wide degree of difference regarding historical knowledge within each

group.

Overall, history classrooms are an excellent source for the analysis of national

imaginaries (Schiffauer & Sunier, 2004) and historical consciousness is constructed by

presenting national and international perspectives to the next generation. In history, as in

many subjects, a selective approach is taken to the past by choosing what is considered

important to better understand the present and omitting what is considered irrelevant.

Thus, the way students talk about the past, present and future has the potential of

revealing what it means to them to be Greek and/or European. In this study, students’

responses to questions regarding historical methods and classroom activity show that

lyceum and IB students’ perceptions follow similar patterns, but with a limited number of

distinct differences. It is this very idea of students’ similar and different orientations to

past, present and future that is explored in the next chapter. By investigating students’

attitudes about the current national and transnational cultural contexts in which they are

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situated, the proceeding analysis provides a set of discourses that contribute to an

understanding of student cultural identity. The underlying assumption of the analysis is

that just as students’ experiences with official and critical knowledge help define patterns

of historical consciousness, so too is historical consciousness an important factor in many

contexts. It is a part of students’ individual and collective identity, it has a bearing on

their interests and it influences their attitudes (Angvik, 1997).

Thus, identifying discourses used to discuss topics related to (1) the meaning of

Europe, (2) European Union integration and (3) Greece’s place vis-à-vis the E.U. and

Europe, a fluid model of student cultural identity characterized by mixture and coexisting

tensions is proposed. The goal of the analysis is to apply historical consciousness as a

way of identifying and describing discourses that students use in discussions of their

current cultural climate. This offers insight into whether a collective European identity

that is promoted in today’s Europe is emerging among these young Greeks. Furthermore,

it helps define the type and degree of influence schools have in the development of

cultural identity. The final analysis suggests that school still has an influence on the

development of identity and that pedagogical approaches are important factors in this

development.

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 CHAPTER 6

IMAGINING CULTURAL IDENTITY AS A SYNCRETIC PROCESS OF

DISCOURSES AMONG GREEK YOUTH

Although much has been written on the subject of European unification, relatively

little is known about the views of young people in Europe (Angvik, 1997; Convery, 1997;

Schiffauer et al, 2004) or how individual schools are balancing national and transnational

processes in history and other school subjects. Since 1973, a number of official surveys

have been carried out by the European Commission to monitor the evolution of public

opinion among member states. These surveys, known as Eurobarometer surveys, have

covered more recently issues such as the European Constitution, enlargement, the euro,

how Europeans see themselves, globalization and European elections. There have been

fewer studies regarding specific views of young people that have not been commissioned

solely by the European Union. The most recent of those that have been carried out

independently include Students’ Attitudes to Europe (Bordas & Giles Jones, 1993), Youth

and History (EUROCLIO, 1996; 1997) and Pupils’ Perceptions of Europe (Convery et

al, 1997). Each of these studies, contributing to the body of information regarding young

people’s attitudes about Europe, was carried out as comparative, multi-country surveys

and in the case of the latter, semi-structured interviews with some of the study’s

participants. The lack of empirical data concerning perspectives of younger generations,

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especially research carried out independently of official European sponsorship, is

emphasized by several writers in Convery et al (1997). Particularly, H. Dekker finds that

there is ‘a strong need for more research with respect to European citizenship,

socialization and education’ and concludes that ‘finding out why socialization for

European citizenship in general and education for European citizenship in particular have

a limited effect…’” (Dekker, 1993, p. 52). Similarly, “Prucha (in Endt & Lenaerts, 1993)

finds that empirical studies are necessary to compare factual knowledge, attitudes and

values shared by students in specific countries” (Convery et al, 1997, p. 13). Finally,

Fogelman (in Edwards, Munn & Fogelman) identifies the need for national and

international surveys of the knowledge, beliefs and activities of young people together

with longitudinal studies of how these develop” (ibid).

In response to calls for national and international inquiries, this chapter provides

empirical evidence which contributes to understandings of young people’s orientation to

Europe. Using the framework for historical consciousness established in the previous

chapter, it takes responses from students at Anatolia College in order to present a

contemporary understanding of Greek student cultural identity, one wherein

characteristics of mixture and coexisting tensions are easily imagined. In doing so, I

address the role of school history in processes of cultural identity formation and conclude

that, (1) indeed, school history is influential, albeit not independently, and (2) student

cultural identity among Anatolia students must be understood as dynamic, active

relationships between different discourses.

There are countless ways in which students’ attitudes and perceptions on the

topics such as those explored in this study may be elicited. The most direct approach is

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to ask students openly about their identifications with, definitions of and opinions about

the topics, taking into consideration that answers may reflect different understandings of

key concepts. This has the strength of candidly exposing their preferences and

evaluations of the topics. The student questionnaire and many questions from interviews

incorporate this approach into the design of the study. Alternatively, one may adopt a

more indirect approach and attempt to analyze specific processes, choices and reactions

that students have to issues presented to them. This type of engagement (e.g., asking

students to take photographs and then discussing their meaning or listening to students

react to other students’ opinions) attempts to gather student-centered conceptions that

may be hidden, invisible, or unthought-of at first in order to create thick descriptions of

their cultural contexts. The following analysis incorporates both approaches into the

design of the project.

FIVE DISCOURSE GENRES OF CULTURAL IDENTITY

Greeks invented civilization and now they are using it as an excuse to do nothing. This is
why all the cafes are full. Nobody works hard here. They use the excuse that our ancient
ancestors did such great things, did all the work and now the modern Greeks can just
relax. But I will tell you what I think is the most important aspect of modern Greek
society. It is to enjoy life. We should enjoy every minute but we tend to live for tomorrow
rather than for today.
—Andreas, Greek 30-something importer, 2003

Like Andreas’ sentiments, the preceding chapter problematizes the homogenizing

effects implicit in projects of nation building by demonstrating the complex, often

contradictory ways in which Greeks negotiate official and critical knowledge. On one

hand, Andreas categorically accepts that “Greeks invented civilization,” a common tenet

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of official knowledge in Greek schools, but criticizes the authority of his declaration by

defining it as simply “an excuse to do nothing,” thus employing a more critical

knowledge approach. In the same way, he places value on his criticism by earnestly

pointing out the need for Greeks to slow down and “enjoy life.” Andreas is quite

comfortable explaining Greek culture within an imaginary of coexisting tensions. That

students in both history divisions at Anatolia College interact with knowledge in highly

creative ways is evidence for the same supposition. In one respect, students in the Greek

lyceum accept the official historical knowledge presented in their history classrooms at

school as a way of succeeding in the system, and at times they contest the validity of the

very ideas this knowledge represents. In another respect, IB students are learning the

complexities of evaluating multiple sources, making judgments, and forming conclusions

that can be justified by reference to well-argued evidence whether it is related to Greek

nationalism, dictatorial rule in Castro’s Cuba, representations of women in Nazi Germany

or the nature of historical knowledge itself. In still another way, teachers in the Greek

lyceum and International Baccalaureate teach what is mandated, albeit differently, and

also stimulate critical reflection on and encourage students to appreciate cultural

perspectives.

By no means is this evaluation meant to romanticize history education at Anatolia

College nor is it to portray the College as an institution par excellence of school history.

However, it does invite critical engagement in the construction of cultural identity among

Greek youth in school and likewise, the exploration of a vision for collective European

identity among them. The conceptualization of Greek cultural identity presented in this

chapter is one of syncretic discourses, of agonistic yet cooperative discourses.

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Specifically, five discourses are identified and described through an interpretive lens of

empirical data from observations, interviews and other evidence. The discourses are

recognized as (1) common cultural heritage, (2) burden of the past, (3) autochthonous

Hellenism, (4) the mobiles and (5) occidentalism. They are understood as fluid,

permeable discourses of Greek cultural identity among Anatolian youth and overlap in

various combinations, resulting in students employing one or more of them at different

times and in different contexts. The discourses emerge from topics introduced and

discussed in their history classes and further explored during interviews and the student

questionnaire. Specifically, students’ past, present and future orientations to three topics

help define the discourses. Specifically, these topics are (1) meanings of Europe, (2)

European integration processes and (3) Greece’s place within the EU and Europe. This

conceptualization of cultural identity as syncretic discourses, as agonistic yet cooperative,

presents a challenge to dominant notions of binary logic often applied to understandings

of identity in Greece (Tziovas, 2001) and likewise, attempts to provide a more nuanced

approach based on “the ironic or jarring juxtaposition of disparate elements”

(Lambropoulos, 2001, p. 221).

The chapter progresses through a discussion of the five discourses and points to

how they are employed in diverse ways by Anatolia lyceum and IB students in various

contexts of cultural interaction in the school ends with a discussion of the relationship

between the discourses and student cultural identity. Likewise, influences from school

history and the possible emergence of a collective cultural identity among young Greek

students close the analysis.

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Common Cultural Heritage

Personally, I feel very European because many of, well, all of European civilizations
have been greatly influenced by the ancient Greek civilization and so I’m Greek and so I
feel that I’m European.
—Eleni, Form V, Regular Lyceum, 2002

The discourse of common cultural heritage is described as a one of shared

inheritance and tradition and is defined by static interpretations of the past. It is

constructed around students’ perceptions of Greece vis-à-vis Europe and the European

Union and tends to be employed by lyceum and IB students alike. Above, Eleni is

employing the discourse mainly as she identifies herself with other Europeans who are

imagined as sharing a similar set of cultural, historical, geographical or other similarities.

In effect, she accepts the Eurocentric stereotype of the superiority and harmony of the

Western European world. Likewise, the Greek claim to a European identity is easily

accepted because she imagines European history and culture as an extension of Greek

history and culture. Importantly, students who employ the discourse understand

European identity as a supplementary identity that does not aspire to be the dominant

identity for anybody (see Appendix B, question 21). Of all student responses on the

questionnaire, 71 percent of lyceum students and 61 percent of IB students expressed

agreement or strong agreement with this perspective on European identity.

Thus, the concept of similarity, but not homogenization, is an important

component of this discourse. Students who use it understand and equate solidarity with

similarity by accentuating the Greeks’ claim that “they were European and conversely

that the Europeans were really Greek” (Jusdanis, 1991, p. 28; Tziovas, 2001, p. 190).

Generally, the discourse is constructed around an imagined affiliation or an imagined

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community wherein interpretations of the past are static and continuous rather than

dynamic and full of ruptures and multi-perspectivity. Elena, another lyceum student

employing the discourse, endorses this claim below in her discussion of Greece and

Europe.

Giampapa: Do you view Greece and Europe as different?

Eleni: No, I believe that Europe came after Greece.
Giampapa: It came out of Greece?
Eleni: Yes, definitely, it came out of Greece.

The common cultural heritage discourse originates in students’ discussions of

Greece’s contribution to Europe and the European Union and reflects strongly on the

official knowledge presented by the Greek Ministry of Education. A general assessment

of this official knowledge is that the teaching of Greek history dominates the entire

schedule and textbooks present Greek history as an uninterrupted continuity from ancient

times to the present in the European context (Petridis & Zografaki, 2002). This leads to

an significant effect of the discourse, i.e., ethnocentric and exclusionary attitudes towards

non-Europeans, non-European Union members or even new E.U. members from Eastern

and Central Europe. For example, when asked if Greece should create strict laws limiting

immigration from new member states (sub-category G), 35 percent of Greek lyceum

students and 63 percent of IB students agreed or totally agreed.37 Figure 6.1 illustrates

these responses as mean values.38

37
Additionally, another 41% and 13%, respectively, were undecided.
38
It should be noted that the student sample for this question was considerably smaller than that of the
other questions on the questionnaire. It was added after the initial questionnaire was administered and
given only to one class in the Greek lyceum (37 students) and one class in the IB (7 students).
Additionally, it was given in May 2004, the month in which the ten new members became officially part of
the E.U. Thus, unlike the larger sample used in the other questions, this one reflects smaller group.
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 In the same question, students disagreed most ardently to the question of whether

unity in Europe is a myth (sub-category E). In fact, as one of the lowest mean scores on

the entire questionnaire (2.76 = Greek lyceum, IB = 2.50), it points to students’ strong

feelings of unity towards Europe. Alone, the results do not specify an important

distinction as to whether students are referring to European culture in general or simply

the political unity of the European Union. What they do represent is a valuable

illustration of the discourse of common cultural heritage. Namely, desires for unity and

for exclusion are easily imagined and it is precisely this contradictory attitude that is

another central theme of this discourse.

4.5

4 27. On May 1, 2004, ten European countries will join

3.5 the European Union. What is your attitude about this
3
enlargement of the EU?
1=totally disagree, 2=disagree, 3=undecided,
Mean Value

2.5
4=agree, 5=totally agree
2

1.5 E. The idea of unity in Europe is a myth.

1
G. Greece should create strict laws limiting immigration
from new member states (ex: impose restrictions to keep
0.5
out Eastern workers for several years).
0
E G
Sub-category

Greek Lyceum International Baccalaureate

Figure 6.1: E.U. Enlargement Graph

Upon discussing the questionnaire results with students, a more subtle

understanding of this attitude was revealed. When asked about the idea of unity in

Europe, lyceum and IB students referred to being members of the same “club,” as in a

European Union and to the “legacies” of ancient Greece that, according to these students,

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are shared by all Europeans (Student Interview, 2002). Thus, the idea of unity is just that,

an ideal. It is an imagined common heritage possessed by all those people born in

Europe. It is considered an inherited culture. Not surprising, then, references to

exclusion appeared to be described in economic, not cultural terms, as a way of

disguising ethnocentric attitudes. However, with further exploration even exclusion was

described in cultural (and contradictory) terms. In particular, students quickly agreed that

a restriction of immigrants is a good idea because these people take jobs away from

Greeks (Fieldnotes, 2004). However, those jobs to which students are referring are ones

that they are unlikely to want or ever take for two reasons: money and prestige. These

jobs, mostly hard labor such as picking olives or stonemasonry, generate very low wages

in Greece and are viewed with little respect. These students, lyceum and IB alike, all of

whom express a desire to attend university and most of whom are interested in studying

economics, law and psychology at university (see Appendix B, question12), are in no

immediate risk of losing their future jobs to immigrants.

So the question becomes, why do these students care if Albanians and Bulgarians,

two groups referred to in interviews and classroom discussions, come to Greece and fill

those jobs that are unwanted by Greeks anyway? The answer relates to the premise that

ethnocentric attitudes are a part of the discourse. In fact, these students are not including

all Europeans in their dream for unity in Europe. Articulated more accurately, they are

consciously excluding some communities in Europe, such as Albanians and Bulgarians,

that historically have been viewed with degradation and contempt in their own national

culture.

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 Historian Efi Avdela agrees that “[b]y retelling a national narrative that evokes a

common past and common cultural traits, school systems reproduce a romantic

conception of the nation state as a natural entity” (p.239). This, in turn, promotes

attitudes of ethnocentrism and exclusion. Not surprising, when given cameras and asked

to take photographs representing one’s cultural identity, many students brought pictures

depicting monuments and other reminders of antiquity around their city, including the

Kamara, or Arch of Galarius39 (Figure 6.2) and Lefkos Pyrgos, or White Tower (Figure

6.3). While these photographs are symbols of the city of Thessaloniki, much like the

Statue of Liberty in New York or the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, students refer

to them as important reminders of Greece’s past. Thus, those students who choose to use

the common cultural heritage discourse emphasize a shared history and cultural heritage

between Greece and other select parts of Europe and understand European history as an

“unfolding and continuous narrative” (Stradling, 2001, 230).

Figure 6.2: Student photograph of the Kamara (Arch of Galarius) in Thessaloniki,

Greece

39
Interestingly, the first photograph, an arch located on Via Egnatia, the historic road connecting
Constantinople to Rome, was constructed by the Romans in 305 AD to celebrate the triumph of the
emperor over the Persians. It is not a Greek structure at all.
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Figure 6.3: Student Photograph of the Lefkos Pyrgos (White Tower) in Thessaloniki,
Greece

The origins of the discourse are found in discussions of Greece vis-à-vis Europe

and the European Union. For example, the student questionnaire addresses various ways

in which Greece’s membership in the European Union is perceived (Appendix A,

Question 23).

5 23. What does Greece’s membership in the E.U. mean to you?

4.5 1=very little, 2=little, 3=some, 4=much, 5=very much
4

3.5
B. Ancient Greek ideals are shared by all E.U. countries and bind them
3
culturally.
C. Greece will benefit economically from its membership in the E.U.
Mean Value

2.5

F. Unlike older generations, Greek youth are developing a more European

2
identity
1.5

0.5

0
B C F
Sub-category

Greek Lyceum International Baccalaureate

Figure 6.4: E.U. Membership Graph

With the exception of the statement addressing Greece’s economic benefit from

the E.U., both groups of students agreed favorably that Greek youth are developing a

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 more European identity. By contrast, Greek lyceum students agree with the idea of

shared ancient Greek ideals (3.13) but IB students disagree with the idea that these ideals

bind all E.U. members culturally (2.67).

In a different question, students were asked to evaluate what “European” means to

them (Appendix A, Question 21). With consistency, lyceum students agreed with the

idea of a shared past and believe in some concept of unity in Europe. IB students also

expressed such feelings of shared past and unity within the European community,

although with slightly less agreement.

4.5

4
21. What does “European” mean to you?
1=very little, 2=little, 3=some, 4=much, 5=very much
3.5

3 B. A shared past and strong sense of history.

Mean Value

2.5 G. A fictional and unreal unity of traditions.

2

1.5

0.5

0
B G
Sub-category

Greek Lyceum International Baccalaureate

Figure 6.5: Meaning of “European” Graph

Primarily, these results suggest that some form of collective or shared identity is

present in both groups of students, a point addressed later in the chapter. Secondarily,

considering the evidence that a common cultural heritage discourse is a central part of the

official history curriculum in the Greek lyceum, it is not surprising that most of these

students choose to draw on the discourse in discussions of Greek identity vis-à-vis

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Europe and the European Union. In other words, students in the Greek lyceum choose to

utilize this discourse more often than those in the IB program. However, evidence

supporting contradictory attitudes among IB responses suggests that many of these

students work within the discourse as well.

For example, during an IB class observation, one student agrees that Greeks feel

closer to other Europeans because they are all members of the same club (Fieldnotes,

2004). He was openly employing this discourse, but the rest of his classmates were not.

In observing their discussion of the European Union, I noticed that much of the class

laughed and disagreed ardently with the students’ unity sentiment. The class reaction is

captured in another student’s comment that “the E.U. is somewhat of an pretend group in

terms of culture, an elusive unity” (Fieldnotes, 2004). In contrast to the discourse, this

student and most others did not accept the premise that identity be defined by similarity.

Clearly, this example demonstrates that some IB students choose not to define their

cultural identity within the common cultural heritage discourse.

By contrast, a discussion with the IB history teacher from the other class reveals

that most of his students do not question the idea of cultural continuity. An excerpt from

our interview illuminates his observation:

Giampapa: Studies that I have read also say that Greek students in
general have very positive feelings toward being part of the
European Union and being European, being Western.
IB Teacher: Yes, certainly, but with themselves being in a superior
position with this, within this western home—because they
are descendants of the Ancient Greeks, because I don’t
know what, because they don’t want to recognize their
inferiority. You know, it’s a very complex, psychologically
complex position of adapting or dealing with these different
things. I don’t think they have ever questioned their

159
 position in class, at least (I.B. Faculty Interview,
10/30/2002).

A number of International Baccalaureate students, at least from the perspective of

their history teacher, are situated within the discourse. They, like others who use the

discourse, view Greece as “founded on standards which are at the same time

discriminatory and universal” (Lambropoulos, 1987). It provides them with feelings of

superiority, esteem and ethnocentrism within European culture. As a result, the discourse

depicts Greece as a “site that excludes and includes…[it] excludes by claiming unique

constitution and continuity, and includes by claiming a universal relevance and

importance” (ibid.). It reflects a paradox of universalism and exclusiveness.

Burden of the Past

We all Greeks stand on and we are proud of what ANCIENT Greeks did, but we haven’t
really attributed anything to, we haven’t really opened, accomplished anything today.
—Nikos, 11th Grade, Greek Lyceum, 2002

Burden of the past is a discourse constructed around the tenuous relationship

between a haughty past and an insufficient present condition. It reflects interpretations of

the Greek and European past that are fixed and glorious and an understanding of the

present condition of Greece as belated with respect to its past. It is employed with

similar frequency by lyceum and IB students. Gregory Jusdanis contributes to an

understanding of this discourse with a description of Europeans’ perceptions of Greece in

his article, The Importance of Being Minor (1990):

On the whole European travelers to Greece took little interest in the

modern Greeks themselves; their concern was for the ancient monuments.
This is especially true after the 1790s when foreign visitors came to
Greece in greater numbers. Until the early 19th century Greece for

160
 Europeans possessed an identity only in terms of its past, regarded by
them in the words of Richard Jenkyns as a heavenly city, a shimmering
fantasy on the far horizon (pp. 5-33).

Anatolian lyceum students who choose to make use of this discourse feel an

urgency that modern Greeks have not lived up to a perceived ascendancy of Greek

antiquity. This evaluation leads to an inferiorizing of modern Greek society and culture

and leads to an overvaluation of the ancient Greek past (Frangoudaki & Dragonas, 1997,

p. A309). Correspondingly, they either feel an inward responsibility for Greek society to

produce something worthy or an outward pressure from others who project an unfair

image upon modern Greek culture. In Belated Modernity and Aesthetic Culture:

Inventing National Literature (1991), Jusdanis discusses this condition and states that

“[m]odern Greeks feel themselves belated in respect to the European and inferior in

respect to the classical” (p. 67).

Nikos, in the section’s opening quote, communicates an inward orientation to the

burden of the past. He expresses satisfaction for the achievements of the Greek past, but

a perceived lack of accomplishment by his own generation and perhaps those of his

parents and grandparents overshadow this feeling. In a different way, the student below

articulates both the inward and outward dimensions of the discourse.

Others do not have a good opinion of Greeks today. They only think of
the ancient Greeks and not who we are today. And they are right because
Greeks don’t know how to treat foreigners anymore…they don’t bother to
treat foreigners with hospitality. This is bad for Greece (IB Student
Interview, 3/1/2004).

For these young Greeks, the discourse corresponds to a cultural burden that must

be endured. On one hand, it is an inward-oriented burden for Nikos, a responsibility to

relinquish the past in favor of concentrating on the present condition. He views modern

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 Greece as inferior and unworthy of its ancient counterpart and feels urgency for his

contemporaries to make a difference or at least change the static condition in which he

perceives Greek culture. On the other hand, it involves acknowledging the unfairness in

using ancient Greek culture as a metonym for modern Greek society and the ability to

criticize the Greek reliance on this popular view. In other words, Alexis rejects the Greek

cultural tendency to stand on the pillars of the past and places value in efforts to make

modern Greek society particularly impressive in its own right.

The use of this discourse suggests a particular orientation to the past that is static

rather than relational, permanent rather than shifting. As such, students functioning

within the discourse view the ancient Greek past as something unchanged and thus,

something of a pillar for comparison. a standard that is unattainable.

4.5
13. What does history mean to you?
4

3.5 1=very little, 2=little, 3=some, 4=much, 5=very much

3
B. Various perspectives depending on who is telling them.
Mean Value

2.5 C. A chance for me to learn from failures and successes of

2
others.
D. Something dead and gone, which has nothing to do
with my present life.
1.5

1
F. Shows the background of the present and explains
0.5 today’s problems.
0
G. An accumulation of cruelties and disasters.
B C D
Sub-category
F G H
H. Something that changes as the present changes.
Greek Lyceum International Baccalaureate

Figure 6.6: Meaning of “History” Graph

As illustrated in the graph above (Figure 6.6), representing students’ responses to the

meaning of history (Appendix A, question 13), the past is something from which these

162
students may learn and compare, but not something that they may understanding

differently by placing today’s values on it or by viewing it from varying perspectives.

Here, Greek lyceum and IB students express strong opinions that history is an

important part of understanding present problems (3.88 and 3.62 respectively), but not

something that changes as the present changes (2.90 and 2.48). Equally, history is not

something that is dead and gone (1.53 and 2.10) nor is it an accumulation of cruelties and

disasters (1.90 and 2.38). These responses invite us to think that they perceive the

historical past as relevant to today in that it provides archetypes and guideposts, such as

those exemplified in Greece’s classical past, to trust and follow. This orientation to the

past is a central feature of the burden of the past discourse and is used most frequently in

history classroom discussions about Greece, past and present. Even when the topic is not

about Greece, the discourse is often employed. For example, during an observation of a

Greek lyceum 10th grade ancient history class studying ancient Egypt, students were

asked for what things Egypt is remembered. From the textbook, students gave two

answers: art and monuments. The teacher then asked, “Where else did people create

great art and monuments?” and the discussion moved to a comparison between ancient

Greece and ancient Egypt. In fact, it became a discussion more about ancient Greece

than ancient Egypt (Fieldnotes, 2002). This is an example of how Greek history (1)

assumes a dominant position in the overall history curriculum and can be found in

discussions of most historical topics and (2) assumes a position of haughtiness and

superiority in most discussions. The same attitudes are expressed in discussions of

democracy. Seventy percent of lyceum students and 50 percent of IB students

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participating in the questionnaire agree that it is the finest legacy of ancient Greece

(Appendix B, Question 18).

In a similar manner, the lyceum and IB students whose photographic

representations display ancient monuments often gave reasons for taking them that may

be described as part of the discourse. For example, when asked why a picture of the

statue of Aristotle (Figure 6.7) represents a part of what it means to be Greek, eleven

different students who took the same photograph of the statue responded in one way or

another that they did so because (1) the statue stands in the central square of the city, the

Square of Aristotle, and (2) it is a reminder of their ancestors’ achievements and their

contemporaries’ disappointments (Student Interviews 2002, 2004). In choosing to use

this discourse as a part of their own cultural identity, these students not only assume an

immediate link with ancient Greece, but also feel compelled to compare it with the

modern society in which they live.

Figure 6.7: Student photograph of the Statue of Aristotle in Thessaloniki, Greece

164
 Herein lies the tenuous and comparative relationship between past and present

that is revealed through the discourse. Articulated into the discipline of school history,

the burden of the past is ubiquitous in a Greek national curriculum that promotes an

idealization of the past and the awareness of Hellenic continuity as central themes. As

evidenced in the following interview transcript with two lyceum students (2002), the

discourse is used primarily in discussions of internal conditions such as the Greek

economy.

Nikos: I think that all that we know today about history, about the past and
all the things that governments, say, make us learn, it’s great.
They have to do that. But it does not matter, we think that they
[Europeans] were all born of us [Greeks], all part of us, which is
great, but…
Maria: Yes, but we are not a very developed or rich country.
Nikos: We have the tendency to follow others and not really do anything.
Maria: And I believe that European people have actually more respect for
ancient Greek civilization than we Greeks ourselves do and they
have better knowledge of it than we do.
Nikos: I think that ninety percent of Greeks think that we are still glorious
[everyone laughs]. Most of us think that we are okay right now.
Everything is good. But ten percent are trying, fighting to do
something better, to make Greece better, to become like the ancient
Greeks were, or even if we can’t do that because it’s very difficult,
just to follow up with others.

The discussion between Maria and Nikos further demonstrates the various

conflicting attitudes about ancient Greece found in this discourse. Like Andreas at the

beginning of the chapter, these students reflect a general richness of contradiction that

exists in the discourse and is a part of their cultural identity. It speaks to the

heterogeneity of students’ cultural identity at Anatolia. Perhaps, most importantly, it

suggests that even though official school history is replete with ideas related to the

discourse, there are students in both divisions who accept and reject it.

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 Moreover, the burden of the past discourse is employed regularly in and about

Greek popular culture. In other words, it is employed regularly outside the school setting

by Greeks and non-Greeks, both of whom use it in defining what is Greece. For

example, a recent advertisement in the New York Times Magazine (3/20/05) makes

obvious the mainstream familiarity with and persuasive power of exploiting this

discourse. The advertisement, sponsored by the Greek Ministry of Tourism, depicts a

beautiful young girl, presumably a “siren,” floating above a set of ionic columns. Across

the middle of the page reads the caption in bold letters, LIVE YOUR MYTH IN

GREECE. In the upper left corner is a description of what one will encounter on a visit

to Greece:

Greece: a land of mythical dimensions, Where the spirit of hospitality

welcomes you as a modern god. And the siren song draws you into its
deep blue waters. Where a gentle breeze through ancient ruins seems to
whisper your name. And a dance until dawn can take on Dionysian
proportions. In Greece, the myths are still very much alive. And in
amongst them sits your own…patiently waiting for you to live it.
Live your myth in Greece. Ask your travel agent.

With the New York Times’ employment of a discourse that links the glories of an

ancient past with an expectation that it will filter into today, visitors arrive in Greece with

romantic expectations of life there, only to discover that their preconceptions are simply

anachronous, even unfair, images for modern Greek society and culture. Thus, with the

help of this discourse, the legacies of Hellenism became culturally embedded in Europe

and other parts of the world, elevated to a status of high expectations and likewise, re-

implanted into the contemporary Greek cultural discourse as a haughty reputation to

maintain. Along with its critical role, perhaps its mainstream familiarity is another

166
reason why IB students employ the discourse so frequently, despite the absence of this

type of official historical knowledge in the IB history curriculum.

As idyllic as the images produced from this discourse are, they are somewhat

removed from the sustainable manners of everyday life in Greece. Beyond the burden of

the past exists a modern European country so often characterized by its historic and

mythic traditions. There is no one welcoming you as a modern god, no sirens luring you

into the water, no ancient ruins whispering your name. Nevertheless, with images of the

past embedded into the media, it is easy to recognize that it is a noticeable part of

Anatolia lyceum and IB students’ cultural identity construct, sometimes employed as

acknowledgement of a glorious past, as official knowledge would persuade, and at other

times as an inward criticism or an outward rejection, as critical knowledge may

encourage them to do. In all its forms, students in both programs utilize this discourse to

define, in part, their understandings of Greek culture today.

Autochthonous Hellenism

Greeks have a very strong national consciousness. We love our country, our history, our
traditions. We like to go abroad to study at the better universities and to make money,
but Greeks will always return or desire to return to Greece, no matter where they are. I
believe that other Europeans do not feel this strongly about their homes.
—Giorgos, 12th Grade, International Baccalaureate, 2004

The discourse of autochthonous Hellenism involves the modernist project’s

conscious effort to develop a native identity rooted in a unique form of local Greekness

while at the same time defining itself vis-à-vis Western Europe. As with the first

discourse, this one is revealed in discussions of Greece vis-à-vis Europe and the

European Union and is defined by a particularly indigenous, local and loyal

167
understanding of Greece’s present condition. Students in the lyceum more frequently

employ it. Above, Giorgos is operating from within this discourse as he expresses strong

sentiments of nationalism and a valuing of his Greek homeland, but making an explicit

comparison to Western standards. In other words, he sees great value in studying in a

Western university, as opposed to a Greek one, but ultimately attaches the greatest

importance to Greek culture.

This conflict between maintaining local tradition and pursuing Western

modernity, a common theme for a group of intellectuals in Greece known as the

Generation of the 1930s and also in today’s Greek history textbooks (Avdela, 2000),

developed into a discourse which sought to construct identity by breaking from Western

Hellenism while at the same time embracing Western standards of comparison. Therein,

Western Hellenism, or the particular ways in which Greece is understood in the West,

includes ideas associating Greece with antiquity, haughtiness, Enlightenment ideology,

elitist appropriations and that which is not Greek. By contrast, Hellenic Hellenism, or the

particular ways in which Greeks understand Greece, is positioned around local

conceptions such as the Greek landscape and folklore of the people. It is the latter that

reflects the discourse of autochthonous Hellenism.

As Artemis Leondis points out in her book, Topographies of Hellenism (1995),

this type of Hellenism is constructed both in terms of “place of birth” and as existing in

comparison to Western Europeans. A central effect of the discourse is the constant

comparisons of modern Greece to the West. However, unlike the previous discourse, this

one takes hold of normalized assumptions about organizations of societies into distinct

divisions and is constructed around a geographical conception of identity.

168
Anthropologist Lisa Malkki, in her discussion on the territorialization of identity,

maintains that not only does the idea of culture carry with it this spatializing tendency,

but it also assumes natural roots of sedentary existence (1997). Considering this, a

discourse such as autochthonous Hellenism may be understood as having essentializing

features of spatial and territorial confinements.

Young Greeks at Anatolia who use this discourse present evidence that they

understand the Greek topos (place) as an important part of their cultural identity. Indeed,

the most common photographic representations of Greek cultural identity are those of the

Greek landscape and every lyceum student who turned in photographs included at least

one picture of the Greek landscape. Equally, discussions with lyceum students about

these representations reveal that they feel a tremendous attachment to the “place” of

Greece.

Figure 6.8: Student photograph of the Greek landscape

They describe these photographs as depicting “the Greek sea,” “the Greek

mountains” (Figure 6.8) and “the beautiful land that we have” and they conjure

169
associations, as one Form 5 student expresses, with the poetry of Nobel laureate George

Seferis, one of Greece’s most well known poets (Student Interview 2002). His work is

undoubtedly situated in this discourse as he describes the allure of Hellenism through the

beauty of the Greek landscape.40 He describes his home in autochthonous terms when he

writes in one of his most well known poems, Mythistorema (1935),

We who set out on this pilgrimage

Looked at the broken statues
Became distracted and said that life is not so easily lost
That death has unexplored paths
And its own particular justice;

That wile we, still upright on our feet, are dying

Affiliated in stone
United in hardness and weakness,
The ancient dead have escaped the circle and risen again
And smiled in a strange silence (Keeley & Sherrand, 1971).

Furthermore, both students’ utilization of the discourse reflects attachments to

local and distinct affiliations within Greece (e.g., Thessaloniki). Thus, it suggests that

students describe themselves first as Thessalonians, then as Greeks and finally as

Europeans. When asked if being European means a sense of belonging firstly to Europe

and secondarily to Greece (Appendix A, question 21), lyceum and IB students ardently

disagreed (82 percent and 74 percent respectively). However, as illustrated below, the

notion of place is more complicated for IB students.

Lyceum students employing this discourse express quite positive feelings about

the importance of Greece’s membership in the European Union. In part, they understand

identity as equivalent to geography, both in attachments to living in Greece and in their

40
Particularly those of the period of the 1930s, a number of Greek poets and writers of the modernist
project employed techniques to bring both tradition and modernity into their works. Examples include
comparing ancient myth with modern antagonisms, fusing oral tradition with textual specificity and
appropriating the landscape for the purpose of defining an aesthetic Greekness.
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 associations with a larger European community. These conceptions of rootedness in

Greece and comparisons to the West almost always mutually exist in discussions of

European integration. Questions twenty-three and twenty-seven of the student

questionnaire (Appendix A), ask students about European Union membership and

enlargement. Responses suggest that students in both the lyceum and IB program feel no

danger of “losing their cultural identity” to a larger European identity and agree that

“Greeks will always retain a strong sense of national identity, traditions, and love for

Greece” no matter how global the E.U. becomes. At the same time, they are in

agreement that “Greek youth are developing a more European identity” and that a

“European constitution is an important step” for European integration (Figure 6.9).

5
23. What does Greece’s membership in the European
4.5
Union mean to you?
1=totally disagree, 2=disagree, 3=undecided, 4=agree, 5=totally agree
4
a. Like other small E.U. countries, Greece is in danger of
3.5 losing its cultural identity
3
b. Unlike older generations, Greek youth are developing a
more European identity.
Mean Value

2.5

27. On May 1, ten European countries will join the E.U.

2
What is your attitude about this enlargement of the E.U.?
1.5
1=totally disagree, 2=disagree, 3=undecided, 4=agree, 5=totally agree
1 c. No matter how global the E.U. becomes, Greeks will
0.5 always retain a strong sense of national identity, traditions,
0
and love for Greece.
A B
Sub-category
C D
d. A European constitution is an important step for the
Regular Lyceum International Baccalaureate smooth functioning of the E.U. after enlargement.

Figure 6.9: E.U. Membership & Enlargement Graph

Corresponding to the discourse of autochthonous Hellenism, this suggests a significant

and confident attachment to Greece and a valuable association to and confidence in the

European Union.

171
 A notable distinction between lyceum and IB students in using this discourse

relates to their interest in the history of particular geographical regions. Figure 6.10

displays students’ responses to the question: “How much interest do you have in the

history of these geographical areas?”

4.5 19. How much interest do you have in the history of these
4 geographical areas?
3.5
1=very little, 2=little, 3=some, 4=much, 5=very much

a. The history of Anatolia College

3
Mean Value

b. The history of Thessaloniki

2.5

c. The history of Macedonia

2

d. The history of Greece

1.5

e. The history of Europe

0.5

f. The history of regions outside Europe

0
A B C D E F
Sub-category

Regular Lyceum International Baccalaureate

Figure 6.10: Geographical Areas Graph

There are many ways to discuss students’ responses to this category. As

displayed in the bar graph (Figure 6.10), the geographical areas of most interest for

lyceum students are Greece (4.33) and Thessaloniki (3.92). The corresponding areas for

International Baccalaureate students are Europe (4.19) and regions outside Europe (4.05).

These results reflect very different, seemingly contrary geographical interests. One way

to approach the data is to say that lyceum students express a national perspective, thus

showing support for history education’s significant role in constructing a national

identity. Since these students experience school history as a set of objective, true facts,

perhaps they accept them with unquestionable value (Zambeta, 2001). Indeed, the

curriculum promotes both strong attachments to Greece and an understanding that

172
membership in the European Union “provides a guarantee to Greeks that this [the

military dictatorship of 1967-1974] will never happen again” (Vice President Interview,

10/23/2002). However, this interpretation places into serious doubt the extent to which

students in state education systems are capable of going beyond official knowledge in

order to question the reproduction of the nation’s cultural narrative. For Anatolia

students, has not been the case. On the contrary, they demonstrate an explicit

understanding of the difference between official and critical knowledge and various

purposes of each. However, their attitudes and opinions more often than not draw a

parallel with the dominant official historical knowledge presented to them.

Again, if the results are interpreted as lyceum students showing more orientation

towards an autochthonous version of Greekness and IB students in a international, or at

least a Western version, one may again look to each group’s history program for

explanation. It is true that topics in the IB history program reflect an internationally

minded, methodological approach to learning history. For example, students may study

communism by examining it from a political, economic and social historical perspective

in three different areas of the world and write a diachronic analysis of it from one of these

historical fields (Fieldnotes, 2002). Through their history program, IB students are much

more familiar with studies of Europe and other parts of the world. This may provide one

reason why these students are more interested in the history of Europe and regions

outside Europe and less inclined to employ the discourse of autochthonous Hellenism.

On the other hand, if we consider the debate raised in the previous chapter we can

ask whether these students learn to appreciate perspectives outside one’s national

perspective in the IB classroom or did they come in with, or choose this program

173
precisely because they already have this orientation to and expectation for knowledge.

As outlined in that chapter, the answer is both of these things. Nevertheless, the

discourse of autochthonous Hellenism is a common discourse for lyceum students, and

much less common among IB students.

The Mobiles

We have our kinita [mobile phones] so we can talk to each any time we want. Even
though she is in Germany and I am here, we do not feel like we are so far. We are
constantly talking to each other. Let’s say, it feels like she never moved away.
—Christina, 12th Grade, RegularLyceum,2002

The discourse of the mobiles denotes a shift in the way young Greeks in both

divisions at Anatolia, perhaps the general youth population, understand the European

space. Unlike the way the discourse of autochthonous Hellenism situates itself around

geographical place, this discourse is situated within a non-territorial, spatial

understanding of the European place. It is defined by a historical consciousness that

understands the technological advancements of the present as positive and as leading to

the expectation for a more international future. These are students who take Europe for

granted in a matter of fact sort of way. They will eat at McDonald’s and Goody’s (the

Greek counterpart), use the common European currency, the euro, with ease, and enjoy

the annual Eurovision Song Contest and Greek buzukia with equal regularity (Fieldnotes,

2002; 2004).41 These students envision Greekness as a transnational Greekness.

41
The Eurovision Song Contest is an international event held annually and consisting of representatives
from any European country who compete in a song contest. In 2004, thirty-nine European countries
participated in the contest. By contrast, Greek buzukia is a traditional form of Greek music commonly
performed live in Greek clubs, taverns and traditional coffeehouses. Especially in buzukia clubs, there are
many cultural customs (e.g., throwing carnations to show appreciation) to which spectators adhere.
174
 Reflecting this particular orientation to historical consciousness, it is expressed by

both groups of students in discussions of European integration. As demonstrated in

Christina’s statement above, mobile phone technology is greatly influencing students’

sense of place. Indeed, with the proliferation of mobile phones in Greek society (they are

ever-present on the campus of Anatolia College), students view other European countries

as “closer” and as not separated so definitely by political boundaries.

Figure 6.11: Student photograph depicting the pervasiveness of mobile phones in

daily life

Because mobile phones allow them to contact a person, not a place (as with

traditional land line telephones), they often think of themselves as with that person.

Christina demonstrates the use of this discourse when she says that she calls her friend in

Germany while sitting at a café in Thessaloniki so that her friend can “be there” with her.

Similarly, another student calls her friend each evening so that they can “do their

homework together.” Thus, it is not surprising that many different students provided

pictures similar to the one here as representations of what it means to be Greek (Figure

175
6.11). When asked about their photographs, the general attitude from students was that

the mobile phone gives them a new kind of freedom in terms of mobility and

inclusiveness. The mobile phone allows them to be anywhere and always connected to

their parea, or community of friends (Fieldnotes 2004). In his book, The European

Dream: How Europe’s Vision of the Future Is Quietly Eclipsing the American Dream

(2004), Jeremy Rifkin contributes to this discourse of The Mobiles in the following:

[T]he early success of the mobile phone technology in Europe speaks

volumes. The cell phone keeps individuals connected in their
communities. But it also allows individuals to break out from the
constraints of geography, to be free of place but still connected to others in
time (p. 91).

The very term “mobile phone” versus “land line” reflects this epistemological

shift; a shift from the essentializing features found in rooted identities having territorial

confinement (Malkki, 1997) and towards a subjectivity of connectedness and proximity.

While the former is a reminder of nation-states’ attempts to create a national identity, the

latter points to the distinctiveness of a different identity project for supra-national

organizations such as the European Union. Reflecting on the process of European

unification, one IB student shares her perspective as follows. “Greece has been a part of

the European Union for as long as I have been alive. I mean, we have been in the

European Community since 1981, yes? It has always been a part of us. It is easy for us

to travel [throughout Europe and the E.U.], because it is just one big horos (space)”

(Student Interview, 03/15/2004). Conceived in this way,

[T]he EU is not a territory-bound entity. Although it coordinates and

regulates activity that takes place within the territorial boundaries of its
nation-state members, it has no claim to territory and is, in fact, an extra-
territorial governing institution. This is what makes the EU unique
(Rifkin, 2004, p. 198).

176
 This discourse rejects older concepts of space based on political and cultural

separation and is somewhat inconsistent with the discourse presented thus far. Akhil

Gupta explains this erstwhile conception as follows:

Our concepts of space have always fundamentally rested on…images of

break, rupture, and disjunction. The recognition of cultures, societies,
nations, all in the plural, is unproblematic exactly because there appears
an unquestionable division, an intrinsic discontinuity, between cultures,
between societies, etc. (Malkki, 1997, p. 58).

In contrast to Gupta’s conception, when students use the mobiles discourse they

do not seem to view proximity as a barrier to forming communities. These students,

lyceum and IB alike, situate themselves and relate easily to concepts of movement and

connectedness. For example, students express strong agreement for the implementation

of the European Union constitution, with 72 percent of lyceum students and 50 percent of

IB students expressing agreement or total agreement for such a document (Appendix B,

question 27). Correspondingly, on November 29, 2004 the heads of state or government

of the twenty-five Member States and the three candidate countries signed the treaty

establishing a Constitution for Europe (www.europa.eu.int).42 Students’ attitudes

towards a constitution suggest a valuable association to and confidence in the European

Union. However, it is probable that most of these students have not read the actual

document of the new constitution. Arguably, then, it is the idea of a collective European

constitution that appeals to them rather than its actual contents. Nevertheless, the

language of the E.U. constitution makes clear that the focus is not on a territory, but

42
All Member States of the European Union must still ratify the treaty.

177
rather a commitment to universal human rights, inclusivity and a global consciousness

(Rifkin, 2004). 43

Examining the discourse of the mobiles at Anatolia, one may focus on

opportunities the school provides to all students for participation in international

activities, of which there are a range. For example, the school helped established the

European Youth Parliament in Greece and hosts the conference in charge of selecting

Greek delegates for the Parliament. Each year, students may also choose to participate in

the Model United Nations program, a world wide high-school simulation of the United

Nations striving to educate students about the United Nations and their work with

contemporary international issues. In addition, students participate in European Union-

sponsored activities, including Comenius (for cooperation between schools throughout

the E.U.) and Lingua (for language teaching and learning). Thus, those who participate

in these activities are in contact with youth from other parts of Europe and view these

sorts of international associations as the “norm.” Kostas, a Form 6 lyceum student, says

that one of his memories of participating in the European Youth Parliament was realizing

that “the kids in other countries are just like we Greek kids” (Student Interview,

02/27/2004). This is not suggesting that Kostas and his classmates are unaware of

attending a privileged private school in Greece, because they are aware of it. Rather, it

points to their use of the mobiles discourse as a way of defining how they view the

European space less as distinct national territories and more as a community of citizens,

43
“The adoption of a European Union Constitution gives the EU legal stature of a country, despite the fact
that this new governing institution has no claim on territory—the traditional hallmark of statehood. While
its provisions allow it to regulate activity within the territories of its members, including activity that affects
property rights and relations, it’s worth emphasizing that the EU is not, in itself, a territory-bound
government. It is, rather, the first transnational government in history whose regulatory powers supercede
the territorial powers of the members that make it up.” (Rifkin, 2004, p. 208).
178
similar to the way the new European constitution envisions the future of Europe. Within

this discourse, the idea of a European culture, in accord with a Greek culture, is easily

imagined.

Occidentalism

It disturbed them, especially the IB1s, the fact that they never did any 20th century Greek
history, like for example the Greek Civil War or the Polytechnio uprising or anything like
that…It’s still considered politics and not proper history. It hasn’t entered the national
myth making…
—IB History Teacher, 2002

The final discourse identified as a part of Anatolia students’ cultural identity is the

discourse of occidentalism. Students who employ this discourse are politically engaged

and want to learn about and form opinions from historical issues that are considered by

the Greek government to present the nation-state in a negative light. In other words, they

are not a part of the national corpus of unifying myths. Their orientation to the past,

present and future of Greece, i.e., historical consciousness, is critical and perspectival and

they apply this discourse to discussions of defining Europe, European integration and

Greece vis-à-vis Europe and the European Union. Overwhelmingly, students in the IB

rather than lyceum employ this discourse.

The IB history teacher quoted above attests to his students’ desire for this kind of

history as does the photograph that one student gave to me as a representation of Greek

identity (Figure 6.12). The photograph, an artistic rendering of three members of the

Greek terrorist organization known as 17th November, was taken from a work of art

displayed at the annual Anatolia College IB Art Show. The IB student who took the

photograph said that it represents “real Greece” as opposed to “the myth of Greece.” IB

179
students express similar attitudes on a variety of responses on the questionnaire. For

example, the following chart showing responses towards questions related to Greece,

Europe and the European Union reflect perceptions that are quite different compared to

lyceum students.

Figure 6.12: Student photograph depicting an artistic rendering of three members

of the 17th November terrorist organization

In each sub-category displayed in Figure 6.13, IB students’ responses reflect less

of an idealistic view of Greece than do lyceum students’ responses.

Young Greeks today Greece is a model for Greece is more a part

tend to be very proud other Balkan of the Balkan
of their Hellenic countries community than the
heritage EU community
Overall Mean 3.02 3.43 2.59
Greek Lyceum Students 3.07 3.60 2.45
IB Students 2.90 2.95 3.00

Figure 6.13: Comparative chart highlighting differences in students’ attitudes

towards Hellenic heritage pride and in Greece’s position in the Balkans

180
Overall, IB students responded negatively to the idea of young Greeks having a sense of

pride in their Hellenic heritage, they do not believe that Greece is a model for other

Balkan countries and they view Greece as more a part of the Balkans than part of the

European Union.

However, in using this discourse students in the IB do not necessarily indicate that

they seek to reject the tenets of the Greek nation-state. Instead, they have a desire to

disrupt taken-for-granted assumptions about the image of Greece and Europe as the ideal

spaces where democracy, tolerance and social integration have been initiated and

developed. This “ideal” is the preferred version which prevails in the European political

discourse and is reproduced in curricular systems (Coulby & Jones, 1995). The Greek

national curriculum is no exception.

Along with the use of the occidentalism discourse as a way of interrupting ideal,

often normalized historical images of Greece and elsewhere in an effort to develop a

more balanced, critical view, the discourse has another slightly different expression

among IB students. A very small group of students are also disrupting these idealized

images but for a different reason. They fear that Greece has been on the downhill path

and is in danger of getting worse. They are very pessimistic about Greece and everything

Greek. They view Western Europe and the West in general as a more advanced society

and thus, are more impressed with non-Greek things. It is rare, but this use of

occidentalism is visible. During a group interview, four IB students explain why “Greece

is not on a good path” in a discussion about censorship by the government (IB Student

Interview, 2002). The two examples of censorship given by these students are poignant

narrative illustrations not only of why some Greek students are looking outward and view

181
Western Europe and the West as more advanced, but they also help describe how

students in the regular lyceum have little opportunities for engaging in the a critical

discourse such as occidentalism, and as a result, do not tend to employ it in discussions.

These examples follow.

A few years ago, there was a European Union-sponsored essay contest for young

people about the European Monetary Union (EMU) and the introduction of the euro, the

new European monetary unit accepted by members of the EMU.44 The contest was

highly publicized in Greece on the news and the winner would receive money and

recognition from the State and the E.U. According to the contest organizers, the purpose

of the contest was “to make students and pupils aware of the EMU and its implications”

and give them an opportunity for “young people to write down their thoughts,

expectations, hopes and fears concerning the EMU” (www.aegee.org/euro/essay.html).

However, there was one catch to the contest in Greece. The State issued that students

only be permitted to write positively about the euro transition. As described by one

lyceum teacher, “this made Anatolia students grumble a bit, but they complied and wrote

the essays” (Faculty Interview, 09/23/2002). This is an excellent example of the

manipulation imposed by the Greek State on the education of its youth. It is in part due

to these impositions that Anatolia students have a specific curiosity for learning about

“negative” historical experiences. As one IB student articulates, history is meant to “feed

our curiosity” (Student Group Interview, 11/08/2002).

44
Currently, the EMU includes twelve Member States: Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany,
Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain. Euro banknotes and coins have
been in circulation since January 1, 2002. Thus, all members of the EMU are members of the E.U., but all
members of the E.U. are not currently members of the EMU.
182
 In Greece students are “submerged in a sea of signs that refer to the past” (van

Vree, 2002, p. 202). They pass by ancient ruins on their way to school, listen to

commemorative speeches on October 28th, go to the cinema to watch Warner Brothers’

version of Achilles in the Trojan War, read in their history books about the Greece’s

struggle for independence and watch current events unfold on the daily news. All these

objects, symbols and representations constitute an expression of historical understanding

and far from being homogeneous, there are dominant and less dominant, conflicting and

even ignominious patterns and representations of history (ibid.). It is these complex

modes of history that IB students understand or are beginning to understand and express

through this discourse. Occidentalism is a pluralistic and critical discourse. As such,

students do not want, for example, to be subject to restrictive perspectives and

interpretations; rather, they aspire to debate and form sound, rational opinions about those

events, such as the Polytechnio uprising, that define controversial points in Greek

contemporary.45 However, as stated earlier, such recent events fall under the domain of

politics, which is viewed as controversial and incompatible with that of school history

according to the Greek State.

A second example occurred during the 2002-2003 academic year. As a highly

centralized educational system, the Greek government decides upon and publishes one

history book for each level at the beginning of each school year. Students receive these

textbooks free of charge and they constitute the entirety of what they are required to

45
On November 17th, 1973 students barricaded themselves behind the walls of the Polytechnic University
in Athens in protest of the military dictatorship in Greece. The military rulers responded by sending in
tanks and at least 12 students are said to have been killed during the conflict. The protest is said to have
shaken the authority of the dictatorship, which ended the following year. Although not a common topic in
history classes in Greece, there is evidence in literature of it being taught in regular lyceum. However, it is
unclear how this has been approached and how consistently.
183
learn, memorize really, in the regular lyceum. Often times they use the same textbook as

the previous year or years, but sometimes a new history textbook is published. This is in

direct conflict with the system in the International Baccalaureate program, which requires

the use of multiple sources for each topic of study. The exception in IB is that students

also use the State mandated history textbook in their Greek history class. In the 2002-

2003 academic year, a new history textbook was published and distributed to only a few

Greek high schools, including Anatolia, before a censor was announced. The controversy

involved a modern presentation in the textbook of George Grivas (1898-1974), a Cyprus-

born military colonel in Greece who earned recognition during the Greek Civil War

following World War II. In brief, he was in favor of enosis, or the union of Cyprus with

Greece and led campaigns in 1950s through the early 1970s towards this means. One IB

teacher describes the controversy:

[The censor] was about the very controversial figure called Grivas who
has also been mythologized in the past decades. So, it’s about that—not
exposing anything, about opposing him in a more historically faithful and
balanced way rather than glorifying him. And this created a lot of
problems. Also because of Grivas’ past. I mean he was a Nazi
collaborator and a fierce anti-communist and then he went to Cyprus…I
mean as far as contemporary history is concerned, I think this is a
problem. The Civil War is still taboo (I.B. Faculty Interview,
10/30/2002).

Ultimately, the textbook was recalled and replaced by an older, somewhat

“outdated edition” as one lyceum teacher describes (09/26/2002). In discussions about

the textbook censorship, some students in the lyceum were not in favor of this kind of

control and all students in the IB were against it. Still others in the lyceum expressed

ambivalence or indifference to the textbook withdraw. For these students, the censorship

made no difference and they are not interested in employing the discourse of

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occidentalism. As such, one of the most distinguishing factors between lyceum and IB

students’ historical consciousness relates to their consideration of various perspectives in

historical study. On the questionnaire (Appendix B, question 13), students are asked

whether history may be conceptualized as “various perspectives depending on who is

telling them.” Fifty percent of IB students agree or totally agree with this statement

(mean score 3.24). Lyceum students are less comfortable with this kind of view of

history (mean score 2.58) as only 31 percent expressed agreement.

For those against the censorship, the new textbook represents two important ideas:

it presents a mythologized figure from a new, critical perspective and it presents a

contemporary issue, i.e., Cyprus; both of which are requisites of occidentalism and are

basics of which lyceum students are often deprived except during those “off the record”

classroom discussions, after which they are told to forget the discussion. For IB students,

the presentation of George Grivas in the textbook is seen as simply “one perspective

among many” that must be acceptable for classroom discussion (IB2 Student Interview,

11/01/2002).

However, more than a rejection of all things Greek, the IB students who employ

this discourse simply are less tolerant of the historical centralizing tendencies of the

Greek government. As one student expresses,

If you have lots of central authority, then you can order people around to
do your bidding. But, in my view, the fundamental fault with the Greek
system is that it’s too centralized. So, you have all these terrible
consequences of reform…Somebody comes to power with progressive
ideas. They want to change a system that is, you, know, that forces kids to
go to frontisteria. They say, this is terrible, let’s do something with the
exams to decrease the need for dependence on frontisteria, so they change

185
 the system and they make it even more dependent on frontisteria (IB
Student Interview, 11/01/2002). 46

Similarly, another IB student employs occidentalism to express his intolerance of

the “top-down system” he perceives to be in place in Greece. He believes that the only

“hope” for Greece is if somebody in power realizes the ineffectiveness of these

centralizing tendencies. He says, “…but, I can’t imagine somebody realizing this,

because when you get into power, you want to constrict, power is tempting, it’s too

seductive” (IB Student Interview, 11/01/2002). He goes on to talk about why he believes

the system is the way it is in Greece.

It’s very interesting to me that Greece is a very recent democracy. It

really has only been a democracy since the fall of the junta in ’74, so
twenty-eight years at most.47 That’s three decades, not even three
decades, [it] is a very short amount of time for Greece to really firmly
establish democratic institutions, democratic ways of thinking…(ibid).

Reactions to this student’s view of democracy in Greece yielded other political

responses from students in the interview that fall within the discourse of the Subaltern as

well. These responses had one common thread—the importance of Greece’s membership

in the European Union. For these students, “one of the best things that happened to

Greece is that it’s become part of the European Union…It provides a guarantee that this

[the junta] will never happen again” and “In terms of firmly establishing democratic

institutions, democratic habits, its relationship with Europe has been essential” (ibid.).

46
Frontisteria are supplementary private schools that students in all schools, public and private, attend
either during their last two years of high school (which is most common) or after graduation, to prepare for
the university entrance examinations (Panhellenic examinations). These after school instructions are very
demanding on students and quite expensive, which leads to questions as to whether Greek education is truly
free.
47
Greece was controlled by a military dictatorship from 1967 to 1974. During this time, the Right
controlled all forms of government institutions.

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These students are developing a historical consciousness, expressed in the Subaltern

discourse, that includes the following: interpretations of “negative” historical experiences

(e.g., the Greek Civil War) as meaningful modes of inquiry, political and critical

engagement with the present condition and expectations for the future that include a

dependence upon Western assistance, especially the European Union.

Considering the general employment of discourses by Anatolia students, the

following chart summarizes the results of the analysis.

DISCOURSE GREEK LYCEUM INTERNATIONAL

BACCALAUREATE
Common Cultural Heritage * *
Burden of the Past * *
Autochthonous Hellenism *
Mobiles * *
Occidentalism *

Figure 6.14: Comparative chart illustrating a general summary of employment of

the five discourse genres among Greek lyceum and IB students at Anatolia College

On the whole, Greek lyceum students utilize and thus situate themselves in the

discourses of common cultural heritage, burden of the past, autochthonous Hellenism

and the mobiles. By contrast, International Baccalaureate students utilize and situate

themselves in the discourses of common cultural heritage, burden of the past, the mobiles

and occidentalism. Noticeably, the two discourses having no substantial overlap are

autochthonous Hellenism and occidentalism. Based on the analysis that autochthonous

Hellenism is a discourse defined by a particularly indigenous and loyal understanding of

Greece’s present condition, it reflects strongly the official knowledge presented to

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students in the Greek lyceum. By contrast, occidentalism is defined by an orientation to

the past, present and future that is critical, evaluative and multi-perspectival. Likewise,

this orientation to historical consciousness reflects the critical knowledge approach most

familiar in IB history classes. It is noteworthy to stress that a substantial number of

students and classroom discussions contradict these generalities, so I emphasize that it is

erroneous to understand Greek youth at Anatolia College, indeed everywhere, in

homogeneous terms. This is an important tenet of my research methodology and

analysis. Thus, these are not static, impermeable categorizations; on the contrary, they

are more accurately described as concepts of mixture, contradiction and coexisting

tensions.

A DISCUSSION ABOUT THE DISCOURSE GENRES

…to put forward a new approach that highlights the complexities and richness of Greek
culture…a new approach to Neohellenism based on the notions of cultural hybridity and
dialogue…
—Prof. Dimitris Tziovas, University of Birmingham, U.K., 2001

The previous chapter examines the negotiation of official and critical knowledge

in Anatolia’s lyceum and IB history classroom contexts. With this examination, it is

concluded that the explicit/implicit structure of these two forms of knowledge play a

reflective role in students’ orientation not only to specific topics of historical study, but in

the broader development of an historical consciousness among them. In turn, this chapter

attempts to apply this conclusion by identifying and describing five specific discourses,

originating in students’ development of historical consciousness, that disclose attitudes

associated with meanings of Europe, positions on European integration and attitudes

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about Greece vis-à-vis Europe and the European Union. From the overall analysis, the

following conclusions are drawn. First, the discourses presented herein can be used to

construct an empirical understanding of cultural identity among these young Greeks.

This suggests an overall relationship between historical consciousness, the five

discourses and student cultural identity. Second, there is evidence for an affirmative and

collective European identity among students at Anatolia. Third, it is understood that

students’ experiences with the pedagogical methods associated with official and critical

knowledge approaches have some bearing on the development of historical consciousness

among them. As a result, historical socialization, i.e., the processes and goals of history

instruction, influences attitudes in a highly complex system. Fourth, the copious overlap

in discourse use between the two groups and negative case examples within discourses

are likely due to students’ extended exposure to the Greek educational system and

relatively limited exposure to IB school history. It is likely that if these students continue

to learn via the IB way, beyond the two-year program at Anatolia, variations between

them and their counterparts in the lyceum will continue to grow. Similarly, if Anatolia

included an IB Middle Years Program for students in the gymnasium, the same result is

likely. The remainder of the chapter elaborates on these conclusions first by providing a

syncretic model for conceptualizing cultural identity as discourses followed by a

discussion of collective cultural identity and influences from school history.

Conceptualizing Cultural Identity as Discourses

It has been established that young Greeks in both divisions at Anatolia express

various positions, attitudes and opinions in their associations with Greece, Europe and the

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European Union and students in each group accept and question taken-for-granted

assumptions presented to them in school and elsewhere. This invites an understanding

that young Greeks recognize themselves as employing multiple discourses in different

situations, thus embracing complex cultural identities. As a result, having a sense of

belonging to a region or State, for example, is not contradictory to feelings of belonging

to a European community, as illustrated in the diverse ways students talk about these

topics. This leads to the first conclusion; namely, the discourses presented herein can be

used to construct a non-binary empirical understanding of cultural identity among young

Greeks at Anatolia College.

Modern Greek scholars often point out the tendency for studies of Greek culture

to separate diverse elements within the culture through neat oppositions (e.g., West/East,

Ancient/Byzantine, Catholic/Orthodox) or fuse the differences into overriding syntheses

and continuities (e.g., uninterrupted connections of Greek culture from antiquity to

modern). These tendencies regularly lead to distinct divisions between people and

societies. As a way of transcending the tendency to present identity as polar oppositions,

an exercise central to this study, I suggest an approach that highlights the complexities

and richness of Greek culture. This approach does not presuppose “homogenization,

fusion, or flattening of oppositions as much as accepting and highlighting them”

(Lambropoulos, 2001, p. 8). Therefore, the discourses used by Anatolia students are

imagined not as static or linear but as “dynamically flexible” and “with antithetical

factors which [endeavor] to avoid as much as possible a polar…understanding of

identity” (ibid.). Accordingly, envisioning them as complex interactions puts forth a

conceptualization of cultural identity that seeks to recognize and appreciate the

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contradictions among these dynamic, competing discourses as students bring them

together temporarily at particular times and in particular contexts. In this way, the variety

of contradictions presented within and between the discourses is acceptable.

For example, the discourse of common cultural heritage is situated around ideas

of similarity and exclusion alike. Students who utilize this discourse understand

Europeans in general as sharing an imagined common heritage, yet ethnocentric attitudes

among the same students reveal desires for the exclusion of certain European

communities that have historically been viewed with degradation in their own national

context. Similarly, the discourse of autochthonous Hellenism is rooted in older

conceptions of “place” and physical geography whereas the mobiles discourse rejects

such an orientation. However, the same students comfortably use both discourses to

describe Greece’s position within the European Union. In the former, students emphasize

local understandings and insist upon a Greek understanding of Greece in a way that

Western Europe does not define it. At the same time, the latter places less emphasis on

the distinctive places in the European Union (e.g., nation-states) and highlights a more

transnational understanding defined by a common European space. Despite the

contradictions within and between discourses, students comfortably move in and out of

them. Thus, in the construction of a modern Greek cultural identity among students, the

question of how to deal with these discontinuities is raised. In other words, how does one

understand that Greek students reject and accept many of the same concepts in an attempt

to construct an identity? The concept of cultural syncretism, as presented in the works of

Dimitris Tziovas and Vasillis Lambropoulos, is a useful theoretical framework for

addressing this question. According to Lambropoulos, the term “syncretism” refers to:

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 the cultural mixing of diverse beliefs and practices within a specific socio-
historical frame; to the congruity of dissent within such a frame, despite
differences of opinion; to the non-organic solidarity of heterodoxy which
constitutes a collective worldview; to the forging together of disparate,
often incompatible, elements from different systems; and to their
intermingling and blending (Lambropoulos, 2001, p. 225).

Articulated into a syncretic model, the five discourses identified and described are

imagined as contributing to students’ cultural identity. In other words, one may state

generally the following—that cultural identity among Greek students is described as the

application of various discourses, specifically common cultural heritage, burden of the

past, autochthonous Hellenism, the mobiles and occidentalism, within a syncretic model

of mixture and heterogeneity. This model is understood as existing within the larger

understanding of cultural identity among Anatolia high school students and as mixing and

intermingling differently for different students. Thus, cultural identity is viewed as

dynamic, active interactions between different discourses, all of which are related to ideas

of Hellenocentrism and Eurocentrism. Notably, these ideas place emphasis on their

respective people, institutions and cultures, yet the model does not suggest that identity

be understood as existing in distinct categories of binary opposition. On the contrary, the

conceptualization of cultural identity as a syncretic process is an attempt to challenge

dominant notions of binary logic and likewise, provide an alternative approach to Greek

cultural identity based on “the ironic or jarring juxtaposition of disparate elements

[discourses in this context]” (Lambropoulos, 2001, p. 221) currently characterizing Greek

students at Anatolia. These students do not utilize one or another discourse, but one

and/or others to describe meanings of Europe, positions regarding the European Union

and attitudes about Greece vis-à-vis them. With the establishment of this model of

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cultural identity, I am able to address the issue of whether a collective European identity

is developing among students at the College, an issue central to today’s discussions of

Europe and the European Union.

Collective European Identity

Perhaps the European Union is prey to a permanent identity crisis with schools

acting as a perpetual fixture in the predicament. For European youth, the objective from

the Council of Ministers to strengthen in young people a sense of European identity is

omnipresent. However, the means for achieving this objective remains undefined and the

responsibility for it has been delegated, since the1988 resolution, to individual member

states. The practical issue of examining this objective with young Europeans is an

important goal of this study. Likewise, the second conclusion suggests that there is a

basis for a European identity, a collective cultural identity, among students at Anatolia

College. Specifically, it is suggested that these students’ cultural identity is one by which

national identities are cast not as alternatives to a European identity, but as compatible

with it. As described by O’Neill (1996) in The Politics of European Integration, “the

boundaries between the domestic or national, and the regional or international milieux,

are replaced in this model by altogether more fluid transactional flows within and

between the different levels and agencies…” (p. 85).

So, empirical evidence concludes that there is a form of collective European

identity among Anatolia College students, but it is a complex cultural identity that is

actively manifested through one or more of the discourses for a multitude of purposes,

including but not limited to: (1) justifying Greece’s membership in Europe and the

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European Union, (2) challenging that Greece’s ancient past is a metonym for modern

society, (3) living up to its past, (4) establishing local conceptions of modern Greece, (5)

making comparisons with the West, (6) engaging in the European space as non-territorial

and transnational, (7) challenging the myths of nationalism and all things Greek, and (8)

engaging with the past, present and future in political and critical ways. Ultimately, a

collective European identity among Anatolia students is related to how these discourses

reflect senses of belonging as well as how they are constructed against them.

Importantly, this form of collective European identity troubles assumptions about the

European space. Its complex characteristics warn that projects of unification not be set

forth on the cultivation of homogeneity and continuity, but on heterogeneity and

contradiction. So, when European Union officials propose initiatives to “strengthen in

young people a sense of European identity,” the complex form of collective European

identity developing in Anatolia students and presented in this study is a constructive

example for consideration.

Influences from School History

Finally, one of the most important contributions that educational research can

make is that of relating students’ attitudes to the context of schooling (Arnove, 1999, p.

14). Thus, while case studies have their limits, their contribution to micro-level

understandings in different types of school settings has potential for describing and

generating local understandings in the wider framework of educational and transnational

processes. In turn, such research may be used to build upon existing collections of case

studies and generate new understandings and relationships in different settings (ibid.).

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The case study of Anatolia College presented in this study is unique and valuable for

several reasons. First, although Anatolia is non-state Greek college-preparatory high

school, it attracts students from many areas of Thessaloniki and other parts of northern

Greece. Thus, it is not a “typical” Greek school as it consists of a more diverse student

body than a usual neighborhood public school. This includes students from urban and

rural areas, from varying socio-economic contexts (although mostly from upper-middle

class economic standing), and some variation in ethnic and religious background,

although not much for the latter (see Section One: Biographical Information in Appendix

B). Second, it offers two programs of study for students in the lyceum: the Greek

national track and the International Baccalaureate Diploma program. This provides for

productive comparative analyses between a national and a non-national curriculum.

Finally, internationalism has long been considered important by the Anatolia community,

which strives to instill within its students a sense of belonging to a transnational

community.

The third and fourth conclusions of the study addresses this important

contribution to educational research and states that the processes and goals of history

instruction at Anatolia College influence students’ attitudes in highly complex ways. It is

difficult to pinpoint exactly why this is the case. However, it is suggested that it is not so

much curricular content that influence attitudes about culture and identity among

students, although this should not be negated as an influential component in the process.

More influential are the comprehensive, versatile ways in which students experience and

negotiate, consciously and/or unconsciously, curricular content and choose to engage in

specific discourses in various contexts as a result of their experiences and negotiations.

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Thus, they may be described as active authors in their own identity choices, but with the

qualifier of not always placing into question normalized cultural assumptions.

All Anatolian students demonstrate an awareness of the difference between

official and critical knowledge operating in the classroom. Lyceum students are learning

to negotiate knowledge in ways to help them succeed in the system rather than for

purposes of broadening perspectives or understanding the production of historical

knowledge. IB students are afforded more opportunities for the latter purpose. Taken

together, then, the presentation and negotiation of curricular content plays a pivotal role

in students’ understandings, positions and attitudes.

Another clear influence of school history relates to the different strengths of the

two programs in place at the school. The structure of the Greek history curriculum is

well established, strong and leaves little room for variation when it comes to succeeding

in the system. History is not taught in a problematic way and students are invited only

unofficially to debate, challenge, argue and think about history topics from a personal,

critical perspective. What is asked of them is mainly to adhere to the ‘truth’ presented by

their teachers. As such, school history is scarcely connected to students’ genuine

inquiries and interests. Ultimately, it is not easy for students in the Greek lyceum to

challenge the authority of official knowledge presented to them in history classes.

Herein, the school succeeds in acting as an ideological site of socialization. Surely, the

systematic, organized mechanisms of reproduction in Anatolia’s Greek lyceum help

maintain the status quo. In turn, this status quo is reflected in the discourses that they

employ most frequently, i.e., common cultural heritage, burden of the past and

autochthonous Hellenism, and in the one they do not employ, i.e., the occidentalist

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discourse. That established, these students do have an awareness of the difference

between official and critical knowledge operating in the classroom and are learning to

negotiate it in ways to help them succeed in the system rather than for purposes of

broadening perspectives or understanding the production of historical knowledge.

However, attempts to produce a homogeneous set of expressive forms or cultural

norms also engender rebellion at the school. One of the most obvious forms of resisting

homogeneity has been the establishment of the International Baccalaureate program.

Like the lyceum, the IB has an equally strong and well-established educational program,

but operates on a much smaller scale at Anatolia. Having approximately 26 students in

its 2004 graduating class compared to 176 in the lyceum counterpart, the IB has less of a

presence and thus, less of an influence in terms of number of students and duration of the

program (only the last two years of high school). In addition, although most students

have one or both parents that are Greek, there is a greater range of diversity among IB

students’ ethnic backgrounds (Appendix B). As a result, IB students’ school experiences

in the national program (prior to entering the IB) reflect their use of the common cultural

heritage and burden of the past discourses, the former with slightly less frequency than

their lyceum counterparts. Conversely, their experiences in the IB program reflect the

frequent use of the occidentalism discourse. While both groups of students utilize the

mobiles discourse, it seems that this discourse is reflective of non-school influences

rather than specific history classroom experiences.

Overall, the influence of the Greek national system is the dominant influence

among all students at Anatolia College. Despite claims by the school community and

European initiatives respectively, there is a noticeable absence of “American influences”

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and a “European dimension” at the classroom level. In other words, students rarely refer

to American values in responses in any of our discussions and never in describing their

school. This is purely an administrative orientation, not manifested at the student level,

at least not in the contexts in which I observed. It may be more present in the school’s

formidable English program, wherein they teach American English language and

literature. In addition, administrators and faculty report consistently in our interviews

that there is no evidence of a European dimension filtering into the curriculum, at least

not in explicit terms. These two absences are also evidenced by the dominance of

national characteristics within the discourses described above. For example, of the five

discourses identified in the study, four of them have points of reference to national more

than international or transnational inspiration. Except for the mobiles discourse, which is

described as a non-territorial, transnational discourse, each discourse reflects the strong

influence of Greek nationalism still present in the curriculum of the Greek lyceum. In

spite of this evidence, there are lucid examples of students challenging the dominant

national influences present in the school.

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 CHAPTER 7

CONCLUSIONS

In the preceding chapters, I present the readers with a narrative of how one

internationally minded educational institution in northern Greece positions itself and

operates in today’s world. Generally, the study explores the relationship between

education and identity. It is suggested that the latter be understood as engagements in

various discourses, the former as a major participant in the process. Specifically, the

study has been concerned with two distinct history education programs offered at the

school, one constructed around a national curriculum and the other around a non-national

curriculum, and how each participates in and influence students’ development of

historical consciousness. In doing so, the goal has been to provide a conceptualization of

cultural identity among these young Greeks in the context of Greek, European and

European Union processes.

In the study, I analyze the ways in which students’ interpretations to the past,

understandings of the present and expectations for the future are mediated by historical

socialization practices in their history classes. Faculty presentations of and students’

responses to current topics of study—contemporary Greece, Europe and the European

199
Union—frame the discussion. This study contributes to studies of educational

ethnography in the context of national and transnational processes from the bottom up.

Revisiting the Research Questions

At this point, I return to the original research questions outlined in the

Introduction. These questions acted as a guide for the study and served as the framework

for the discussion. The first question explores how and why administrators at Anatolia

College define the institution’s educational philosophy. In interviews with three key

administrators, two consistent themes contribute to the framing of a functioning

educational philosophy for the school. First, the presence of an international orientation

to education is perceived to be in place and this is a continually desired ambition of each

administrator at his respective level of responsibility. Second, each administrator

identifies Thessaloniki, the city in which the school is situated, as a politically and

culturally conservative city, making the maintenance between maintaining tradition and

pursuing change within the school an existing and complex project. Both of these themes

are reflected in students’ attitudes and in the discourses that they employ.

The second question invites a comparison of history programs in place in the

Greek lyceum and International Baccalaureate divisions of Anatolia College. Generally,

two forms of knowledge production are discernible in the school. Official knowledge, or

educational knowledge which the state constructs and distributes in educational

institutions, is the dominant approach in the Greek lyceum. Critical knowledge,

emphasizing processes of discovery and considerations of perspective over a

comprehensive body of knowledge, is the dominant approach in the International

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Baccalaureate program. Thus, while the national history curriculum at the school

continues to operate as a top-down, centralized system whose goal is the reproduction of

official knowledge, the non-national curriculum rejects this pedagogy in order to engage

students in critical inquiry and historical processes. By observing these pedagogical

practices in classrooms and exploring their influence with members of the educational

community there, it is revealed that both forms of knowledge operate in each program;

the dominant approach in explicit ways and the non-dominant approach in implicit ways

respectively. These two forms of knowledge production play a reciprocal role in the

development of historical consciousness among students in the College, i.e., how they

interpret the past, understand the present and their expectations for the future. This

conception of historical consciousness, in turn, was used to address the third research

question.

This question asks how Anatolia students talk about issues related to Europe,

European integration and Greece vis-à-vis them. In other words, what are discourses that

students employ to culturally situate themselves. Five discourses, originating from

students’ orientations to historical consciousness, are elaborated as the forging together of

disparate, often incompatible ideas that intermingle and blend in complex ways. These

discourses—common cultural heritage, burden of the past, autochthonous Hellenism, the

mobiles and occidentalism—are understood as significant processes of student cultural

identity. As such, they reflect attitudes and opinions about their Greek and European

cultural environments and point to the presence of a complex collective European

identity, one that takes on different forms and is influenced by school history in ways that

continually filter and reformulate it.

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 The fourth research question invites discussion about a collective European

identity. In light of the European Union initiative to “strengthen in young people a sense

of European identity,” the study explores whether students at the school understand

themselves as both Greek and European. I am suggesting that Greek students’ cultural

identity is one by which national identities are cast not as alternatives to a European

identity, but as compatible with it. As a result, having a sense of belonging to a region or

State, for example, is not contradictory with feelings of belonging to a European

community.

The fifth question addresses the influence of school knowledge, particularly

history education, on these processes of identity development. Overall, the influence of

the Greek national system is the dominant influence among students at Anatolia College.

However, there are lucid examples of students challenging these dominant national

influences in part because history teachers in the lyceum creatively work within the

confines of a highly centralized educational system yet still create copious opportunities

for independent thought among students. Similarly, teachers in the IB generate a level of

critical thinking that is constructive and productive for students’ understanding of their

local context and beyond.

Generalizability of the Findings

Although this study purports only to reach certain conclusions regarding the

relationship between school history and cultural identity among students at Anatolia

College, it is arguable that there are some generalizations about education and identity

that can be made in the European context. Jean Monnet, one of the original supporters of

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a united Europe, remarked, “If I had to start it all again, I would start with education”

(Convery et al, 1997). His comment alludes to the role that education can play in

influencing young minds. Although education has only recently come into focus in

European Union legislation and documentation, as in the Resolution for a European

Dimension in Education (1988) and Article 126 and 127 of the Maastricht Treat (1993), it

is steadily assuming a more important place in the development of a united Europe

(ibid.). This study, therefore, contributes to that body of research concerned with

education in Europe and the European Union. Although a formal European dimension is

conspicuously absent at Anatolia College, the school has a long tradition of international-

mindedness, but like schools in many European countries, the dominance of the national

system is still present. Thus, it is a constructive educational site for investigating the

transnational processes currently taking place in the European Union from the oft-

neglected perspective of young people there.

Specifically, one of the most important goals of the study has been to approach

these processes from the perspective of cultural identity not as a static set of binary

oppositions, but as the cultural mixing of diverse beliefs and practices and as congruities

of dissent within such a context. As Lampropoulos states, this approach does not

presuppose “homogenization, fusion, or flattening of oppositions as much as accepting

and highlighting them.” As a general contribution, then, this educational study

challenges general assumptions of the European unification project, of which Greece is a

part, in an effort to move productively beyond them by thinking differently about them.

One assumption is that Europe constructs itself as a post-national space through

language and geography. Thus, the concept that the European Community is fashioned as

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a post-national space implies the cultivation of ‘common interests’ (Gourgouris, 1992).

Such cultivation cannot take place without establishing standards to which all members

aspire. There are obvious complications with this assumption; chiefly, the issue of how

Europe must reproduce ‘the people’ as Europeans. In other words, the messiness in the

assumption of a transnational Europe is how to make the people who are already

considered ethnic members of its community; e.g., Hellenes, Portuguese, French,

Germans, reconsider themselves as transethnics, i.e. Europeans (Gourgouris, 1992, p. 47).

Second, a central component of unification is the assumption that the people of

the European community operate within a dominant Western orientation to institutions of

power. This orientation is based on traditions of legal thought and practice traced back to

the institutions of Roman law.48 Indeed, it appears that without consistent relations with

the institutions of Law and State, unity is unrealizable. Advocating Roman law as the

guardian of European identity raises many questions, namely, how is this new European

identity project going to contend with all those people who do not share this particular

legal legacy (Gourgouris, 1992, p. 52)? And, is there room for antagonistic, which is not

to say incompatible, European identities? From the educational level, this study suggests

ways of approaching both of these assumptions.

48
A debatable position on the orientation of European jurisprudence is that it is based on the tradition of
legal thought and practice that is traced back to the institutions of Roman law. For Carl Schmitt (1944;
1990), Roman law stands as the prototype of a common language that binds the social-geographical space
identified as Europe, a language arising (and this is the key) out of the various histories of application and
interpretation of law over the centuries (Gourgouris, 1992, p. 51).

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Contributions to the Field of Comparative and International Education

Although the study has been descriptive rather than prescriptive, the study also

contributes specific and general research to the field of comparative and international

education. A significant end result of any ethnographic fieldwork is to consider the

potential benefits of the research to the participants. Thus, the study provides Anatolia

College with research about their students as actors in a changing Europe, and therefore

about Anatolia’s history programs and students’ responses to them in an exploratory

environment. Specifically, knowledge about how Greece’s youth understand and situate

themselves with regard to European current affairs have emerged and, in turn, reveal to

the school how their history education programs are responding to European Union

initiatives to develop and improve cooperation.

Broadly, knowledge gained from the study, grounded in the voices of students and

the experience of the classroom, adds fresh perspectives to the existing pool of

educational research based on textbooks and curriculum analyses in the European

context. With the deficiency in knowledge about the experience of schooling itself, a

crucial component of education; namely, what actually goes on in the classroom, is

relatively unknown. Particularly in the European Union, these student-grounded

perspectives will contribute to the development of new goals for teaching history in

Europe, goals that reject history education as a place for the cultivation of ethnocentric

ideas and accept the responsibility of history education as a subject that can be taught

from a national or a non-national approach through which differences are recognized and

respected, rights are acknowledged, collaboration is learned and practiced, and new

perspectives are taught. These ideas take shape with teachers and students in the

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classroom and I believe it is in this direction, from student voice to policy

implementation, that the educational system in Greece and elsewhere in Europe must

begin to move for effective educational influences and responsibilities to take shape.

Aporias and Further Avenues of Research

The final question asks us what are the difficult questions that may result from an

ethnographic case study of Anatolia College. This invites us to explore the aporias, or

stuck places, as I have employed the word, resulting from the study. Viewed as a

descriptive analysis, this research has yielded some interesting conclusions, some of them

conforming to previous research and some of them contributing new perspectives to the

literature. Undoubtedly, a great deal of additional empirical research is needed to make a

more comparative contribution to the field of education in Europe. This includes both

qualitative and quantitative methods, as both are constructive forms of data collection.

This study, in fact, is suitable for generating supposition and possibilities and has mainly

an exploratory, not a confirmatory character.

One difficult question is related to the complexity of cultural identity. The

mechanisms which produce and reproduce representations of self obviously are not only

found in schools. While this study examines only processes in the school setting, and

only in the history classrooms, there are other extremely important socio-cultural factors

to consider. For example, issues of gender, family influence, varying parental ethnicities,

socio-economic class (although a high SES among students was made evident), travel

experience, media influence, and other school subjects were not addressed directly in the

study. Beyond the classroom, in their homes, on their television screens, and in their

206
general non-school activities, the complexities of these issues are being mediated. With

more detailed attention on these areas, further understandings are surely to be made.

Another interesting avenue of research is to investigate the International

Baccalaureate program in other schools in Greece, all of which are in the Athens area, as

well as programs in other parts of Europe and beyond. With some comparative analysis

to other IB programs, it is possible to discuss more thoroughly the influence of a non-

national history program on students. This study suggests that Anatolia IB students have

more opportunities for critical knowledge production and thus are developing a historical

consciousness that is just slightly more progressive in character than their counterparts in

the Greek lyceum. Perhaps this is due to their short exposure to the IB pedagogical

methods. Thus, empirical studies involving students who have participated in the

Primary Years Program (ages 3-12) and/or the Middle Years Program (ages 11-16) in

addition to the Diploma Program (last two years of high school) have the potential of

yielding more interesting results regarding the IB program in general and its specific

influence within various nation-states.

Finally, the dangers and seductions of attempting to describe or define young

Greeks should not be understated. The findings of this study do not purport to provide

general characteristics of all young Greeks. However, the findings would be made more

complementary by the participation from students and teachers in other schools in

Greece, both public and private, as well as insights from individuals from the Greek

Ministry of Education. With regard to other schools, an interesting starting point is to

conduct a similar study at Athens College, a school very similar to Anatolia College.

Both share similar Greek and American roots, have IB Diploma programs and the

207
mission statement for each school is comparable in many respects. Thus, it is a

potentially productive site for examining the same issue of school history and cultural

identity, but with further emphasis on differences within Greece (e.g., between the two

largest cities and between the regions of a Macedonia and Attica) and ties with the United

States. Furthermore, I am most interested in emphases on regions and issues closer to

Greece (e.g., the Balkan region and the FYROM issue) that will undoubtedly provide

interestingly different contributions to studies of historical consciousness, history

education and Europe and to Greece as a Balkan state in the European Union and

likewise, Greece as a European state in the Balkans.

208
 APPENDIX A

STUDENT QUESTIONNAIRE

209
 Anatolia College Student Questionnaire

NOTE: Students were given the choice to complete the questionnaire in Greek or
English. Most chose to complete it in Greek. This is the English translation.

SECTION ONE: BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION

1. Are you a boy or a girl?

a. Boy
b. Girl

2. What is your age?

_____ years old

3. Which form are you in at Anatolia?

_________________________________________________________________

4. Are you in the I.B. program?

a. Yes
b. No

5. In which form did you enter Anatolia?

__________________________________________________________________

6. Where do your parents/guardians live?

_________________________________________________________________

7. Are you a boarding student?

a. Yes
b. No

8. Which nationality are your parents?

Mother _____________________________________________________
Father ___________________________________________________________

9. What kind of education do your parents have?

a. No formal education
b. Not more than gymnasium
c. Vocational training
d. High-school
e. Higher education or university education
f. Other (please explain) ________________________________________________________

210
10. To which religious community do you belong?
c. Orthodox
d. Protestant
e. Jewish
f. Catholic
g. Islamic
h. Other _____________________________________________________________

11. At a rough guess, how many books are there in your home?
a. up to 10
b. 11 to 50
c. 51 to 200
d. 200 to 500
e. more than 500

12. Do you want to go to college?

a. Yes
b. No
If you answered yes, where do you want to go to college?
_____________________________________________________________

And, what do you think you might like to study?

_____________________________________________________________

SECTION TWO: IN THIS SECTION, USE THE SCALES GIVEN TO RANK EACH IDEA IN
EACH OF THE QUESTIONS. DO NOT LEAVE ANY LINES BLANK!

13. What does history MEAN to you?

1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
_____ a. A set of facts in my history textbooks
_____ b. Various perspectives depending upon who is telling them
_____ c. A chance for me to learn from failures and successes of others
_____ d. Something dead and gone, which has nothing to do with my present life
_____ e. It teaches me how to think critically
_____ f. Shows the background of the present and explains today’s problems
_____ g. An accumulation of cruelties and disasters
_____ h. Something that changes as the present changes
_____ i. The stories of different nations

14. In your opinion, what importance have the following GOALS of learning history?
1 = very little, 2 = little, 3 = some, 4 = much, 5 = very much
_____ a. Knowledge of the past
_____ b. Understanding of the present
_____ c. Orientation for the future

211
15. What presentations of history do you TRUST?
1 = very little, 2 = little, 3 = some, 4 = much, 5 = very much
_____ a. School textbooks
_____ b. Primary source documents
_____ c. Historical novels
_____ d. Films about historical events
_____ e. TV documentaries
_____ f. Teachers telling
_____ g. Other adults (e.g. parents, grandparents) telling
_____ h. Museums and historical sites

16. What usually happens in your HISTORY CLASSES at Anatolia?

1 = very seldom, 2 = seldom, 3 = sometimes, 4 = often, 5 = very often
_____ a. We listen to teachers’ stories about the past
_____ b. We are informed of what is good or bad, right or wrong in history
_____ c. We discuss different interpretations of what happened in the past
_____ d. We study historical sources, e.g. documents, maps, pictures (outside the textbook)
_____ e. We retell and reinterpret history ourselves in discussions and writing assignments
_____ f. We watch historical videos and films
_____ g. We do research projects by using sources in the library
_____ h. We visit museums and historical sites
_____ i. We memorize facts about history

17. If you could decide what to teach in your history classes at Anatolia, how important would
these HISTORICAL METHODS be to you? In other words, how would you like to learn
history?
1 = very little, 2 = little, 3 = some, 4 = much, 5 = very much
_____ a. To seek knowledge about the main facts in history
_____ b. To morally judge historical events according to the standards of human and civil rights
_____ c. To compare different perspectives of the same events
_____ d. To understand the behaviors of past persons by reconstructing the special situations
and contemporary thoughts of the period when they lived
_____ e. To use history to explain the situations in the world today and to find out the
tendencies of change
_____ f. To learn to acknowledge the traditions, characteristics, and values of the Greek nation
_____ g. To examine how ancient Greece influences modern societies

18. What are your views on DEMOCRACY?

1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
_____ a. It is a government of the people, for the people and by the people

212
 _____ b. It is the finest legacy of classical Greece.
_____ c. It is the result of a long process of trial and error through time
_____ d. It is no more than acclaim for some party leaders in elections
_____ e. It is rule by law and justice and protection of minorities
_____ f. It is a pretense, hiding the fact that the rich and powerful have always won in history
_____ g. It is not real until women and men have equal rights in all situations

19. How much interest do you have in the history of these GEOGRAPHICAL AREAS?
1 = very little, 2 = little, 3 = some, 4 = much, 5 = very much
_____ a. The history of Anatolia College
_____ b. The history of Thessaloniki
_____ c. The history of Macedonia
_____ d. The history of Greece
_____ e. The history of Europe
_____ f. The history of regions outside Europe

20. What are your views on the NATION?

1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
_____ a. Nations are born, grow and perish in history, just like everything else
_____ b. Nations are natural entities, unified by common origin, language, history and culture
_____ c. Nations represent a will to create a common future, despite cultural differences in the past
_____ d. Young Greeks today tend to be very proud of the Hellenic heritage
_____ e. National groups have the right to go to war to make their own state
_____ f. Nation-states should give an essential part of their sovereignty to a supernational organization

21. What does “EUROPEAN” mean to you?

1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
_____ a. Knowledge of more than one language
_____ b. A shared past and strong sense of history
_____ c. Hope for the future
_____ d. An identity that is non-American, non-Asian, and non-African
_____ e. A sense of belonging firstly to Europe and secondarily to Greece
_____ f. A supplementary identity which does not aspire to be the dominant identity for anybody
_____ g. A fictional and unreal unity of traditions

22. What do EUROPE and EUROPEAN INTEGRATION mean to you?

1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
_____ a. Europe is a geographical expression, no more
_____ b. Europe is the birthplace of democracy, enlightenment and progress

213
 _____ c. European integration is the only way to peace between nations that previously attempted to
destroy one another
_____ d. European integration is a danger to sovereign nations, especially to their identity and culture
_____ e. European integration will solve the economic and social crises of the countries in Europe
_____ f. The European Union will always be dominated by a few powerful nation-states

23. What does Greece’s membership in the EUROPEAN UNION mean to you?
1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
_____ a. Greece has always been a part of Western Europe so it’s natural to be an E.U. member
_____ b. Ancient Greek ideals are shared by all E.U. countries and bind them culturally
_____ c. Greece will benefit economically from its membership in the E.U.
_____ d. It is a guarantee of democratic government
_____ e. Like other small E.U. countries, Greece is in danger of losing its cultural identity
_____ f. Unlike older generations, Greek youth are developing a more European identity
_____ g. The most important contribution that Greece brings to the E.U. is its rich historical past
_____ h. It would be better for Greeks if Greece left the E.U.

24. After 1989, many people have talked about the ‘return’ of the BALKANS to Europe. What are your
views on the Balkans?
1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
_____ a. Forty years of cold war has isolated the Balkans from Western Europe
_____ b. Greece is a model for other Balkan countries
_____ c. Greece is more a part of the Balkan community than the E.U. community
_____ d. The collapse of the Soviet Union changed the perceptions of the past and the ways of writing
history in the Balkans
_____ e. The Balkans represent the future of Europe
_____ f. Today, people living in the Balkans are unified

25. In War and Peace, written in the 1860s, Leo Tolstoy wrote that as historians of different
nationalities begin describing the same event, history simply becomes a series of
contradictions. What do you think about his belief?
1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
_____ a. He is wrong. There must be a correct history that is agreed upon by everyone
_____ b. Writing over 130 years ago, Tolstoy’s ideas about history are outdated
_____ c. It is okay that history is full of contradictions
_____ d. History can never be one set of facts about the past because the facts are always
interpretations by some person or group of people
_____ e. Tolstoy’s beliefs about history were greatly influenced by the time and place in which
he lived (Russia in the 19th century)
_____ f. Tolstoy is right because history is constantly being rewritten by each new generation

214
26. People often see history as a line in time. Which of the following lines would you think best
describes history? (CHOOSE ONLY ONE LINE IN THIS QUESTION!)

_____ a. Things generally get better

_____ b. Things generally do not really change
_____ c. Things generally get worse
_____ d. Things generally repeat themselves
_____ e. Things generally go form one extreme to another
_____ f. Things generally move like a roots of a tree,
constantly intertwining and overlapping

27. On May 1, 2004, ten European countries will join the European Union (Estonia, Latvia,
Lithuania, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary, Cyprus and Malta). What
is your attitude about this ENLARGEMENT of the EU?

1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree

_____ a. With the expansion, the EU will be transformed from a posh club of like-minded
nations to a mixture of countries differing in wealth and perspective.

_____ b. It is an historic event that will push Europe into a post-national era where the
divide between domestic and foreign policy is being erased and borders are
increasingly irrelevant.

_____ c. A European constitution is an important step for the smooth functioning of the EU
after enlargement.

_____ d. It has been said, “In the West, Europe is a project. In the East, it is a memory.” With
this expansion, Europeans want to make Europe whole again.

_____ e. The idea of unity in Europe is a myth.

_____ f. ‘Realpolitik’, which holds that nations should not interfere in one another’s internal
affairs, is still the most useful arrangement for preserving distinct national cultures.

_____ g. Greece should create strict laws limiting immigration from new member states (ex:
impose restrictions to keep out Eastern workers for several years).

_____ h. Opening the door to these new countries will take away money from Greece
and intensify our own economic problems.

_____ i. No matter how global the EU becomes, Greeks will always retain a strong sense
of national identity, traditions, and love for Greece.

215
 APPENDIX B

QUESTIONNAIRE RESULTS AS MEAN SCORES

216
Note: All responses have been translated into English for this Appendix

SECTION ONE: BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION

1. Are you a boy or a girl?

a. Boy 33
b. Girl 48

2. What is your age?

15 years old 3
16 years old 45
17 years old 33

3. Which form are you in at Anatolia?

Students answered in various ways, i.e., A’ or B’ Lykeion, 4th, 5th, or 6th Form.
Thus, it is impossible to compile the data in a clear way.

4. Are you in the I.B. program?

a. Yes 21
b. No 60

5. In which form did you enter Anatolia?

1st: 56
2nd: 1
3rd: 1
4th: 4
5th: 15
6th: 2

6. Where do your parents/guardians live?

Thessaloniki: 56
Thessaloniki-Panorama: 7
Athens: 1
Greece 1
Patra (Greece): 1
Kavala (Greece): 1
Corinth (Greece): 1
Germany: 2
Karpenisi (Greece): 1
Florina (Greece): 1

217
 Drama (Greece): 2
Lesvos/Mitilini (Greece): 1
Karditsa (Greece): 2
Neoharouda (Greece): 1
No Answer: 2
Thessaloniki for the moment but usually Romania: 1
My father typically lives in Greece Salonica but he is always abroad
for business: 1

7. Are you a boarding student?

a. Yes 13
b. No 68

8. Which nationality are your parents?

Mother: Greek 71
Romanian 1
Albanian 1
Italian 1
Bulgarian 1
Russian 1
Greek-Italian 1
South African 1
Irish 1
Austrian 1
French 1

Father: Greek 74
Romanian 1
British 1
Bulgarian 1
American 1
Russian 1
Palestinian 1
No Answer 1

9. What kind of education do your parents have?

a. No formal education 0
b. Not more than gymnasium 1
c. Vocational training 0
d. High-school 20
e. Higher education or university education 64
f. Other (please explain)
“My father has higher studies in music” 1
“My father graduated from the Russian
Military Academy” 1
218
 “My Father: Elementary School” 1

10. To which religious community do you belong?

a. Orthodox 73
b. Protestant 1
c. Jewish 1
d. Catholic 0
e. Islamic0
f. Other 1 Athriskos (not religious)
1 Orthodoksi ousiastika dev gvwrizw (I’m Orthodox, but in
essence I do not know)
2 Russian Orthodox
1 Atheist
1 No Answer

11. At a rough guess, how many books are there in your home?
a. up to 10 0
b. 11 to 50 8
c. 51 to 200 22
d. 200 to 500 25
e. more than 500 24
No Answer 2

12. Do you want to go to college?

Yes ALL
No
If you answered yes, where do you want to go to college?
America 8
America(Boston) 1
MIT or Harvard 1
Thessaloniki 39
Thessaloniki & then America 2
Athens 5
Crete 1
Peiraias 1
Greece 7
England/UK 10
London School of Economics1
Spain 1
France 1
Austria 1
Komotini (Greece) 1
Sweden 1
Russia 1
Abroad 1

219
 I don’t know 1
No Answer 4

And, what do you think you might like to study?

Economics 15
Law 14
Psychology 6
Theater/Performing Arts 5
Medicine 4
Military 4
Business 4
Engineering 4
Architecture 4
Pharmacy 3
Mass Media Communication 3
Journalism 3
Dentistry 2
Music 2
English Literature 2
Modern Greek Literature 2
Computer Science/Design 2
Biology 1
Education 1
Mathematics 1
Physics 1
International Relations 1
Undecided 9
No Answer 2

SECTION TWO: IN THIS SECTION, USE THE SCALES GIVEN TO RANK

EACH IDEA IN EACH OF THE QUESTIONS. 49

13. What does history MEAN to you?

1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
a. A set of facts in my history textbooks
R: 2.58
IB: 2.90

49
Mean scores are figured from a range of 1-5, with lower scores denoting negative responses
(disagreement, seldom, very little) and higher scores denoting positive responses (agreement, often, very
much), depending on the question. A score of “3” always denotes neutral responses (undecided or some).
Generally, scores under 3.00 are interpreted as negative responses to the question and scores over 3.00 are
interpreted as positive responses. In addition, R = Regular Greek Lykeion Students and IB = International
Baccalaureate Program Students.

220
 b. Various perspectives depending upon who is telling them
R: 2.58
IB: 3.24

c. A chance for me to learn from failures and successes of others

R: 3.20
IB: 3.14

d. Something dead and gone, which has nothing to do with my present life
R: 1.53
IB: 2.10

e. It teaches me how to think critically

R: 3.73
IB: 3.48

f. Shows the background of the present and explains today’s problems

R: 3.88
IB: 3.62

g. An accumulation of cruelties and disasters

R: 1.90
IB: 2.38

h. Something that changes as the present changes

R: 2.90
IB: 2.48

i. The stories of different nations

R: 4.22
IB: 3.48

14. In your opinion, what importance have the following GOALS of learning
history?
1 = very little, 2 = little, 3 = some, 4 = much, 5 = very much
a. Knowledge of the past
R: 4.08
IB: 4.29

b. Understanding of the present

R: 3.55
IB: 3.81

221
 c. Orientation for the future
R: 3.28
IB: 3.10

15. What presentations of history do you TRUST?

1 = very little, 2 = little, 3 = some, 4 = much, 5 = very much
a. School textbooks
R: 3.12
IB: 2.29

b. Primary source documents

R: 4.33
IB: 4.00

c. Historical novels
R: 2.30
IB: 2.86

d. Films about historical events

R: 2.28
IB: 2.45

e. TV documentaries
R: 3.57
IB: 3.38

f. Teachers telling
R: 3.23
IB: 3.38

g. Other adults (e.g. parents, grandparents) telling

R: 2.87
IB: 2.90

h. Museums and historical sites

R: 4.28
IB: 4.30

16. What usually happens in your HISTORY CLASSES at Anatolia?

1 = very seldom, 2 = seldom, 3 = sometimes, 4 = often, 5 = very often
a. We listen to teachers’ stories about the past
R: 2.36
IB: 2.45

222
 b. We are informed of what is good or bad, right or wrong in history
R: 2.37
IB: 2.00

c. We discuss different interpretations of what happened in the past

R: 3.46
IB: 3.50

d. We study historical sources, e.g. documents, maps, pictures (outside the

textbook)
R: 2.97
IB: 3.45

e. We retell and reinterpret history ourselves in discussions and writing

assignments
R: 2.58
IB: 2.80

f. We watch historical videos and films

R: 1.62
IB: 1.30

g. We do research projects by using sources in the library

R: 1.43
IB: 2.35

h. We visit museums and historical sites

R; 2.31
IB: 1.75

i. We memorize facts about history

R: 4.61
IB: 3.35

17. If you could decide what to teach in your history classes at Anatolia, how
important would these HISTORICAL METHODS be to you? In other words,
how would you like to learn history?
1 = very little, 2 = little, 3 = some, 4 = much, 5 = very much
a. To seek knowledge about the main facts in history
R: 3.90
IB: 3.67

223
 b. To morally judge historical events according to the standards of human
and civil rights
R: 3.59
IB: 3.33

c. To compare different perspectives of the same events

R: 3.66
IB: 4.19

d. To understand the behaviors of past persons by reconstructing the special

situations and contemporary thoughts of the period when they lived
R: 3.83
IB: 3.62

e. To use history to explain the situations in the world today and to find out
the tendencies of change
R: 3.67
IB: 3.43

f. To learn to acknowledge the traditions, characteristics, and values of the

Greek nation
R: 3.71
IB: 2.90

g. To examine how ancient Greece influences modern societies

R: 3.66
IB: 2.95

18. What are your views on DEMOCRACY?

1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
a. It is a government of the people, for the people and by the people
R: 3.85
IB: 3.90

b. It is the finest legacy of classical Greece.

R: 3.78
IB: 3.55

c. It is the result of a long process of trial and error through time

R: 3.32
IB: 3.29

d. It is no more than acclaim for some party leaders in elections

R: 2.15
IB: 2.81
224
 e. It is rule by law and justice and protection of minorities
R: 3.55
IB: 3.10

f. It is a pretense, hiding the fact that the rich and powerful have always won in
history
R: 2.75
IB: 2.57

g. It is not real until women and men have equal rights in all situations
R: 3.95
IB: 3.48

19. How much interest do you have in the history of these GEOGRAPHICAL
AREAS?
1 = very little, 2 = little, 3 = some, 4 = much, 5 = very much
a. The history of Anatolia College
R: 2.38
IB: 2.19

b. The history of Thessaloniki

R: 3.92
IB: 3.33

c. The history of Macedonia

R: 3.47
IB: 3.10

d. The history of Greece

R: 4.33
IB: 3.71

e. The history of Europe

R: 3.43
IB: 4.19

f. The history of regions outside Europe

R: 2.95
IB: 4.05

225
20. What are your views on the NATION?
1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
a. Nations are born, grow and perish in history, just like everything else
R: 2.26
IB: 3.48

b. Nations are natural entities, unified by common origin, language, history and
culture
R: 3.95
IB: 3.67

c. Nations represent a will to create a common future, despite cultural differences

in the past
R: 3.38
IB: 3.29

d. Young Greeks today tend to be very proud of the Hellenic heritage

R: 3.07
IB: 2.90

e. National groups have the right to go to war to make their own state
R: 2.25
IB: 2.43

f. Nation-states should give an essential part of their sovereignty to a supernational

organization
R: 2.25
IB: 2.81

21. What does “EUROPEAN” mean to you?

1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
a. Knowledge of more than one language
R: 2.60
IB: 2.71

b. A shared past and strong sense of history

R: 3.03
IB: 3.43

c. Hope for the future

R: 3.52
IB: 3.57

226
 d. An identity that is non-American, non-Asian, and non-African
R: 3.25
IB: 2.62

e. A sense of belonging firstly to Europe and secondarily to Greece

R: 2.02
IB: 2.62

f. A supplementary identity which does not aspire to be the dominant identity for
anybody
R: 3.78
IB: 3.43

g. A fictional and unreal unity of traditions

R: 2.87
IB: 2.29

22. What do EUROPE and EUROPEAN INTEGRATION mean to you?

1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
a. Europe is a geographical expression, no more
R: 2.10
IB: 2.35

b. Europe is the birthplace of democracy, enlightenment and progress

R: 3.56
IB: 3.33

c. European integration is the only way to peace between nations that previously
attempted to destroy one another
R: 3.20
IB: 2.95

d. European integration is a danger to sovereign nations, especially to their identity

and culture
R: 2.83
IB: 2.73

e. European integration will solve the economic and social crises of the countries in
Europe
R: 2.80
IB: 3.27

f. The European Union will always be dominated by a few powerful nation-states

R: 3.71
IB: 3.41
227
23. What does Greece’s membership in the EUROPEAN UNION mean to you?
1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
a. Greece has always been a part of Western Europe so it’s natural to be an E.U.
member
R: 3.13
IB: 2.76

b. Ancient Greek ideals are shared by all E.U. countries and bind them culturally
R: 3.13
IB: 2.67

c. Greece will benefit economically from its membership in the E.U.

R: 3.72
IB: 3.76

d. It is a guarantee of democratic government

R: 3.20
IB: 2.71

e. Like other small E.U. countries, Greece is in danger of losing its cultural identity
R: 2.73
IB: 2.76

f. Unlike older generations, Greek youth are developing a more European identity
R: 3.58
IB: 3.14

g. The most important contribution that Greece brings to the E.U. is its rich
historical past
R: 1.65
IB: 2.52

h. It would be better for Greeks if Greece left the E.U.

R: This statement was inadvertently left off of the Greek version of the
questionnaire. Since the majority of students chose to use the Greek version, the
results from the few answering the English version are inconsequential.

24. After 1989, many people have talked about the ‘return’ of the BALKANS to
Europe. What are your views on the Balkans?
1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
a. Forty years of cold war has isolated the Balkans from Western Europe
R: 3.57
IB: 3.24

228
 b. Greece is a model for other Balkan countries
R: 3.60
IB: 2.95

c. Greece is more a part of the Balkan community than the E.U. community
R: 2.45
IB: 3.00

d. The collapse of the Soviet Union changed the perceptions of the past and the
ways of writing history in the Balkans
R: 3.30
IB: 3.29

e. The Balkans represents the future of Europe

R: 2.18
IB: 2.14

f. Today, people living in the Balkans are unified

R: 2.20
IB: 1.95

25. In War and Peace, written in the 1860s, Leo Tolstoy wrote that as historians
of different nationalities begin describing the same event, history simply
becomes a series of contradictions. What do you think about his belief?
1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree
a. He is wrong. There must be a correct history that is agreed upon by
everyone
R: 2.33
IB: 2.14

b. Writing over 130 years ago, Tolstoy’s ideas about history are outdated
R: 2.03
IB: 1.95

c. It is okay that history is full of contradictions

R: 2.47
IB: 3.05

d. History can never be one set of facts about the past because the facts are
always interpretations by some person or group of people
R: 3.72
IB: 3.81

229
 e. Tolstoy’s beliefs about history were greatly influenced by the time and
place in which he lived (Russia in the 19th century)
R: 3.42
IB: 3.19

f. Tolstoy is right because history is constantly being rewritten by each new

generation
R: 3.57
IB: 3.33

26. People often see history as a line in time. Which of the following lines would
you think best describes history? (CHOOSE ONLY ONE LINE IN THIS
QUESTION!)

a. Things generally get better

R: 2
IB: 0

b. Things generally do not really change

R: 1
IB: 1

c. Things generally get worse

R: 1
IB: 1

d. Things generally repeat themselves

R: 31
IB: 7

e. Things generally go form one extreme to another

R: 1
IB: 2

f. Things generally move like a roots of a tree, constantly intertwining and

overlapping
R: 24
IB: 5

230
27. On May 1, 2004, ten European countries will join the European Union (Estonia,
Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary, Cyprus, and
Malta). What is your attitude abouit this ENLARGEMENT of the EU?

1 = totally disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = undecided, 4 = agree, 5 = totally agree

a. With the expansion, the EU will be transformed from a posh club of like-minded
nations to a mixture of countries differing in wealth and perspective.
R: 3.62
IB: 3.13

b. It is an historic event that will push Europe into a post-national era where the
divide between domestic and foreign policy is being erased and borders are
increasingly irrelevant.
R: 3.08
IB: 3.63

c. A European constitution is an important step for the smooth functioning of the

EU after enlargement.
R: 3.78
IB: 3.50

d. It has been said, “In the West, Europe is a project. In the East, it is a memory.”
With this expansion, Europeans want to make Europe whole again.
R: 3.46
IB: 3.00

e. The idea of unity in Europe is a myth.

R: 2.76
IB: 2.50

f. ‘Realpolitik’, which holds that nations should not interfere in one another’s
internal affairs, is still the most useful arrangement for preserving distinct national
cultures.
R: 3.59
IB: 3.00

g. Greece should create strict laws limiting immigration from new member states
(ex: impose restrictions to keep out Eastern workers for several years).
R: 3.11
IB: 3.75

h. Opening the door to these new countries will take away money from Greece and
intensify our own economic problems.
R: 3.11
IB: 2.38
231
i. No matter how global the EU becomes, Greeks will always retain a strong sense of
national identity, traditions, and love for Greece.
R: 4.00
IB: 3.13

(Question #27):
One student wrote in on this question: Dev exw problnma me tnv evtoksn perissoterwv
kratwv stnv E.E.

One student responded by both rating the statements (as asked) and writing in his own
responses to some of the statements. Following are his ratings and his own responses.
a. 3
b. 2 “Panta tha iparhei i ektasi enos kratous kai aftos odiahorismos”
Translation: There are always going to be the space of a state and that will work
as a separating point. (Greece is going to be what it is and you will have to go into
Greece. In other words, Europe will never be like the U.S. in terms of state
borders.)
c. 4 “An then ginei auto, ola ta kratoi tha droun opos theloun.”
Translation: If this doesn’t happen, all of the States will act however they want.
d. 3
e. 2 “Auti i apopsi epikrati tora alla mporei eukola na anatrapei.”
Translation: This is the current opinion, but it can easily change.
f. 3 “Sosto omos idi exoun paremvei ta krati se upothesei allov kratwv.”
Translation: Correct but already states have interfered in the affairs of other
states.
g. 3
h. 3 “Isws omos ginoun kai eisagoges apo alles xores.”
Translation: But perhaps there will also be importations from other countries.
i. 5

Another student writes in the following response and points to the first statement (a):
Sumfovo apoluta me tin parakato apopsi pistevo omos pos vasikos stoxos autis tis
dieurinsis einai to oikonomiko kerdos.” Translation: I totally agree with the statement
below but I believe that the main goal of this expansion is economic profit. She did not
rate this sub-section.

232
 APPENDIX C

LETTERS TO PARTICIPANTS

233
November 2002

Dear Students,

My name is Robin Giampapa and I am a doctoral candidate in the United States at Ohio
State University. I am researching history education in the European Union. Before
beginning my Ph.D. program, I taught Ancient and Modern World History for six years
in a private college preparatory school for girls. Currently, I hold Bachelor and Master’s
degrees in Education and Multicultural Studies from Ohio State University.

During the first half of the 2002-2003 academic year, I will be doing research at your
school for my dissertation. I am interested in how students at Anatolia understand
history. When I finish, all of my research will be made available to the school as a
published Ph.D. dissertation for reflection and insight about Anatolia College in Greece
and the European Union. Thereafter, I will revise my research for publication as a book.

While at your school, I will be observing classrooms and school activities, doing
interviews with students and faculty, and looking at the textbooks that you use in class.
In addition, I will give a questionnaire to a sample of volunteering students. If you
decide to participate, I will ask to interview you in a small group or one-on-one for about
20 minutes and/or I will ask you to take a 20-minute questionnaire. I will arrange
interview times that are convenient for you, either during the school day or after school.
During any interview, I will only audiotape it with your approval and I will not use your
real name in my written publications in order to protect your identity. Also, you will
always have the opportunity to review what you said to insure that you are comfortable
with it.

Participation in this study is completely voluntary and if you decide to take part in it, you
are free to withdraw your consent and stop participation at any time. In addition, your
parents/guardians must sign a form to give you permission to participate.

I look forward to working with your school this year.

Sincerely,

Robin Giampapa

234
November 2002

Dear Parents,

My name is Robin Giampapa and I am a doctoral candidate in the United States at Ohio
State University. I am studying comparative and international education in Europe and
the United States. Generally, I am interested in the role of historical knowledge in an
increasingly global world. Before beginning my Ph.D. program, I taught Ancient and
Modern World History for six years in a private college preparatory school for girls.
Currently, I hold Bachelor and Master’s degrees in Education and Multicultural Studies
from Ohio State University.

During the first half of the 2002-2003 academic year, I will conduct a case study of the
lyceum at Anatolia College for my dissertation. Broadly, I am examining in the role that
educational institutions play in the processes of European integration. Specifically, my
research will focus on the ways in which teachers and students at Anatolia College
understand and cultivate cultural identity, historical consciousness and ideas about the
European Union within their school community. Findings from the project will be made
available as a published Ph.D. dissertation for reflection and insight about Anatolia
College within the contexts of Greece and the European Union. Thereafter, I intend to
revise my case study for publication as a book.

The study will involve observations of classrooms and school activities, interviews with
students and faculty, and analysis of school documents. In addition, a questionnaire will
be administered to a sample of volunteering students. If your child should decide to
participate, I will ask to interview her/him (approximately 20 minutes) and/or take a 20-
minute questionnaire. No other time outside the school day will be required except when
it is more convenient for your child to meet after the school day. If we do sit down for an
interview, it will only be audiotaped with your child’s and your consent.

All data from the study will be confidential and securely stored at all times. Any
disclosure of information from the study will use pseudonyms in order to protect your
child’s identity. As stated in the enclosed consent form, participation in this study is
completely voluntary and if your child decides to take part in it, he/she is free to
withdraw consent and discontinue participation at any time.

If your child decides to participate, please complete and return the enclosed consent form
in the envelope provided. Keep the extra copy for your own record. If you have any
questions, please feel free to contact me at 0945-974-817 or giampapa.4@osu.edu.

Thank you very much.

Sincerely,

Robin Giampapa

235
October 2002

Dear Faculty,

I have had the pleasure of meeting many of you already. As I continue to become
acquainted with each of you, I would like to share a few things about my self and my
research. As you may know, I am a doctoral candidate in the United States at Ohio State
University. I am studying comparative and international education in Europe. Generally,
I am interested in the role of historical knowledge in an increasingly global world.
Before beginning my Ph.D. program, I taught Ancient and Modern World History for six
years in a private college preparatory school for girls. This school, similar to Anatolia
College in philosophy and mission, has contributed notably to my familiarity with and
experience in private education. Currently, I hold Bachelor and Master’s degrees in
Education and Multicultural Studies respectively from Ohio State University.

During the first half of the 2002-2003 academic year, I will conduct a case study of the
lyceum at Anatolia College for my dissertation. Broadly, I am examining the role that
educational institutions play in the processes of European integration. Specifically, my
research will focus on the ways in which teachers and students at Anatolia College
understand and cultivate a cultural identity, historical consciousness and ideas about the
European Union within their school community. The formal parameters of my project
focus on teachers of history, but insight from other faculty is ardently welcome.
Information gained from the study may illuminate attitudes and perceptions of students
and teachers and may contribute to descriptions of your current educational environment.
In addition, findings from the project will be made available to participants both during
the research process and as a published Ph.D. dissertation for reflection and insight about
the situatedness of Anatolia College in Greece and the European Union.

The study will involve participant observation of classrooms and school activities,
interviews with students and faculty, and an exploration of available school documents.
In addition, a questionnaire, informed by initial findings from the study, will be
administered to a sample of students in the lyceum. If you should decide to participate, I
will ask to observe students in your class and/or conduct a 30-minute interview with you.
If we do sit down for an interview, it will only be audio-taped with your consent.

All data from the study will be coded to ensure confidentiality and securely stored at all
times. Any disclosure of information from the study will use pseudonyms in order to
protect your identity. Moreover, you will have the opportunity to review sections of draft
reports to insure that you are comfortable with the ways in which you are represented.
Participation in this dissertation study is completely voluntary and if you decide to take
part in it, you are completely free to withdraw your consent and discontinue your
participation at any time. I look forward to working with you at Anatolia this year.

Sincerely,
Robin Giampapa

236
 Outline of Dissertation Research Study at Anatolia College
Robin Giampapa
The Ohio State University
Columbus, Ohio USA

Prepared for the Anatolia College Faculty

October 2002

I. Introduction
A united Europe presupposes critical challenges for the future, including issues related to the preservation
of cultural identity, educating for unification, and the ascendancy of the West. Equally, research
concerning history education and attitudes of youth in the European context has been rather limited,
focusing mainly on theoretical questions rather than ethnographic research (Dragonas and Frangoudaki
2000). The project entitled Youth and History: A Comparative European Survey on Historical
Consciousness and Political Attitudes Among Adolescents is a recent empirical study dedicated to
examining historical and political culture of European teenagers (Angvik and von Borries 1997). In it,
32,000 teens in 27 European countries, including Greece, participated in a questionnaire that attempted to
operationalize the concept of historical consciousness (understandings of the present, interpretations of the
past, and perspectives on the future) (Nielsen 1997).

This research project asks for further consideration in the area of historical consciousness and provides
significant data to work within, against, and beyond. Specifically, the distinctive qualities of the Greek data
appear both promising and contradictory. Based on the assumption that the processes of globalization, of
which the European Union is one subject, do not sweep away all before them and homogenize everything,
research in local school communities with cross-nationally minded missions becomes a valuable field of
research. Consequentially, local structures and institutions, processes and practices, especially those related
to education, are perhaps crucial to and necessary for the cooperation of a global community.

II. Research Statement

The focus of my study is twofold. First, it explores students’ and teachers’ perceptions of historical thought
and methods as they are constructed at Anatolia (preferable both regular lyceum and IB). Second, this
research explores the politics of historical research and history education in Greece and the E.U.. With this
research, I will generate descriptions of the collective ethos of students’ cultural worlds and processes of
self-definition at Anatolia College and use these descriptions in tandem with E.U. educational initiatives to
assess how students at Anatolia are responding to external influences, both nationally and from abroad, as
they relate to history education. With these descriptions, I propose to specifically explore the seemingly
contradictory forces working within Greece today; namely, the cultivation of a European cultural identity
and the challenge of maintaining a sovereign national curriculum.

Simply stated, the purpose is to critically examine three challenges facing Greece vis-à-vis European
integration—(1) cultural identity, (2) education for unification, and (3) the power of the ideological West.

Theoretically, my research focuses on perceptions of, socialization to, and influences on historical
knowledge. It walks along the border between two questions: “How do we perceive and propagate our
perceptions of history?” and via this question, “Do our perceptions of history become a stimulus for a
ritualized process of nationalism?”

237
III. Research Questions
With the development of the European Union, the idea of sovereign national curricula is being challenged.
A concrete manifestation of this challenge in Europe is known as the European dimension in education
(Brock and Tulasiewicz 1994, 2000). With this in mind, four general questions provide the guiding
framework of my study.

a. European Union: Is a European dimension, broadly defined as the development of a spirit of European
collaboration and comradeship among European youth, being manifested in history education at
Anatolia College? If so, How? To what extent? With what effects?

b. Student Identity: In the historical development of nation-states, schools have been one site for
cultivating national identity. However, globalization theory suggests the erosion of national forces,
including specific identity attachments, as cultures and boundaries become radically transformed.
How is this debate envisioned and/or formulated at Anatolia College (as a local and an educational
setting)? Specifically, what are features of student identity at Anatolia?

c. Historical Consciousness: What are Anatolia students’ perceptions of historical knowledge and
methods? How do they interpret their past and understand their present, and what are their expectations
for the future with respect to Europe?

d. Critical Analysis: What critical questions may result from a study of historical research and history
education at Anatolia College and how can such questions be useful, dangerous, seductive, productive
for the school? For the field of European history education? For history education in a global world?

IV. Research Design & Methodology

Based on my general research questions and theoretical purpose grounded in exploration, ethnographic case
study fieldwork provides the most adequate strategy for engaging with the Anatolia community. Further,
interpretive epistemologies, or ways of constructing knowledge as the researcher and the participants
interact and shape one another, frame my work. This implies that research is reciprocal and recursive.
Thus, my approach suggests that forms of knowledge are always partial, positioned, and perspectival.
What this means for my research is the replacement of generalizing narratives with local, contextualized,
and non-essentializing conceptual strategies within the Anatolia community. The only way to collect such
perspectives is through contact with students and faculty. As a result, my research at Anatolia is intended
to focus on the poststructural premise that strives for the development of a mutual production of a multi-
voiced, multi-centered text from data.

Participants: Students, Faculty, Administrators

Students: 1st, 2nd, 3rd Regular Lyceum, 2nd , 3rd IB Program
Faculty: History Teachers at Anatolia (regular and IB), History Professors (ACT)
Administrators: 2 Deans, IB Director, Vice President, President (Anatolia), Chair of History (ACT)

Field Observations: First Semester 2002-2003

I propose to conduct my research during the first semester of the 2002-2003 school year at Anatolia
College. Daily field observations includes the observation of history and literature classes in action as well
as observing other aspects of the school environment. For volunteering faculty, I will ask to observe 1-3
class sessions.

Interviews: 30 minutes in duration

The number of interviews ultimately depends upon the response of interested participants, but ideally,
formal, in-depth interviews with 5 lyceum teachers (from regular and IB), all administrators listed above, 2
ACT history professors, and several group interviews with students is desired.

238
Student Questionnaire: 20-minute, take-home questionnaire
From the varied perceptual responses in the in-depth interviews, I will create a questionnaire to give to a sample of
students at Anatolia. The purpose is to have some element of representativeness and comparability to other data
gathered in order to explore continuities, discontinuities, patterns, and perceptions on a more quantitative scale.

School Documents: Mission and Philosophy Statement, History Curricula (regular and IB), History
Textbooks, Student Reading Lists, Anatolia Histories (Stephens’, Compton), Other (such as school newsletters,
student newspapers, school website, etc.).

V. Rationale for Data Gathering Methods

Methods must necessarily be varied in order to synthesize research participants’ behaviors and thoughts in
different situations and to conduct a valid ethnographic case study. Thus, I anticipate using four methods to
gather information based on a qualitative research design: (1) field observations, (2) interviews, (3)
questionnaire and (4) document analysis. From such data, analysis of the 4 guiding research questions may
be accomplished.

Field Observations: I propose to spend several months at Anatolia College observing and interacting with
students, faculty and administrators in order to gather detailed, descriptive field notes. Because superior
ethnographic fieldwork calls for prolonged exposure to the environment of study, my plan is to spend up to
6 months in Thessaloniki. Thus, a minimum of 20 and a maximum of 50 field observations in the school
are preferred. This includes days filled by observing classes in action, observing other aspects of the school
environment and talking to those in the Anatolia community. Ultimately, the time and duration of each
observation is at the discretion and convenience of faculty and administration.

Interviews: I have created interview questions to guide individual and/or group discussions with students,
history and literature teachers/professors and several administrators. Overall, the interviews are intended to
elicit stories, ask open-ended questions, and provide the opportunity for unexpected avenues of thought
from participants. These interviews should be conducted with student, faculty and members of the
administration on a voluntary basis and should be conducted during times other than classroom instruction
time (for students and faculty). This may include time during independent study periods, before or after
school, or during school breaks.

Questionnaire: From the varied perceptual responses in the in-depth interviews, I will create a grounded
questionnaire to give to a sample of students at Anatolia. From the questionnaire, I mean to gather
biographical information, elicit perceptions of European unity, Greek nationalism and history, ask students
to categorize, prioritize, and procure varied responses from open-ended and closed-ended question types.
The purpose of the questionnaire is to have some element of representativeness and comparability to other
data gathered, not necessarily to make broad generalizations, as this is not the purpose of my case study,
but rather to explore continuities and/or discontinuities that may be present in Greek students’ perceptions
about their own history education and attitudes about Greece in Europe.

Document Analysis: To compare observational data with ideas and perceptions of a European dimension at
Anatolia College, it is important to do archival work. This includes document analysis of several European
Union treaties, including the Schuman Plan (1950), the Rome Treaties (1957), the Maastricht Treaty
(1993), the Amsterdam Treaty (1997), and the SOCRATES programme for education (1995-1999 & 2000-
2006), and various UNESCO programs. Equally, indispensable documents include the mission statement
of Anatolia College, history textbooks, curricular guides and published histories of the school.

VI. Objectives for Anatolia College

A significant end result is to consider the potential benefits of my research to Anatolia College. Generally,
I intend to provide the institution with research about their students as actors in a changing Europe, and
therefore about Anatolia students’ perceptions of the E.U., history, and student identity in an exploratory
environment. Ethically, I do not intend to provide information about individual students or about the
success of the school’s mission. Instead, the purpose is to assemble descriptions of the collective ethos
about Greek education vis-à-vis the European Union and specifically to make visible students’ own
239
perceptions of their education as it relates to their larger place within a changing Europe. Throughout my
research, the goal is to maintain credibility as a researcher, not as a consultant imposing value judgements
on the school. With this in mind, several specific objectives for the institution are sought.

1. To increase awareness of Anatolia students’ perceptions about and goals for their history education.
2. To use such awareness as useful directives for collaborating with the institution as a whole in
responding to the needs of the student body and for building and maintaining a vanguard
position in the larger context of European education.
3. To generate ethnographic descriptions of students’ cultural worlds and processes of self-definition.
4. To use these descriptions in tandem with EU education initiatives to assess how students at Anatolia
are responding to external influences (within Greece and abroad) as they relate to secondary education.
5. To use the project’s focus on what students identify as important in their own worlds to draw
educators (teachers, administrators, researchers) closer to the concerns of the young people at
Anatolia, and, to the extent possible, translate research findings into professional development
activities.
6. To engage with school faculty and administrators in mutual professional development
activities during and after the research, and to assist with school classes, programs and
objectives in ways that they see fit.

VII. Post-Research
On a professional level, an intended outcome of my research at Anatolia College is the formation of critical
questions concerning the nature and role of historical knowledge and history education in a globally
evolving world. These are questions that I foresee addressing in an academic career in comparative and
international education upon receiving my Ph.D. Thus, as a first action, I plan to revise my Ph.D.
dissertation for publication as a book. This is in direct relation to my goal of continuing to cultivate a
research partnership with the Anatolia, both in the interest of promoting the school’s needs and my own
professional demands for ongoing scholarly dialogue regarding European history education. Overall, an
integral and obligatory part of ethnographic research today is to maintain a responsibility towards the
cooperating institution. Thus, the interests of Anatolia College are continually at the forefront of my work.

VIII. Dissertation Committee at Ohio State University

Professor Peter Demerath, Anthropological Studies
Demerath.1@osu.edu

Professor Gregory Jusdanis, Chairman, Modern Greek Studies

Jusdanis.1@osu.edu

Professor Robert Lawson, Comparative Education (Advisor)

Lawson.8@osu.edu

240
 APPENDIX D

CONSENT FORMS

241
 THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY

CONSENT FOR STUDENT PARTICIPATION IN SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL RESEARCH

Protocol title: A Case Study of Anatolia College: Exploring Historical Consciousness

Protocol number: 02B0126

Principal Investigator: Dr. Robert F. Lawson, Supervising Professor, The Ohio State University

Co-Investigator: Robin Giampapa, Doctoral Candidate

I consent to my child’s participation in dissertation research being conducted by Robin Giampapa of The
Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, USA.

CIRCLE “YES” OR “NO” FOR EACH CONSENT.

YES NO I give consent for my child to take part in an interview.
YES NO I give consent to the use of audiotapes during interviews.
YES NO I give consent for my child to take a questionnaire related to this research study.

Ms. Giampapa has explained the purpose of the study, the procedures that will be followed, and the amount
of time it will take. This has been accomplished through a verbal introduction to my child at Anatolia
College and in the accompanying letter. Correspondingly, I understand how the collected data will be used
for this study.

I know that my child can choose not to participate without penalty to him/her. If my child agrees to
participate, he/she can withdraw from the study at any time, and there will be no penalty.

I can contact Robin Giampapa by leaving a message in the office at Anatolia College or via her mobile
phone in Greece: 0945-974-817 or E-mail: Giampapa.4@osu.edu. I have had time to contact Robin to ask
questions and to obtain answers to my questions. If I have questions about my child’s rights as a research
participant, I can call the Office of Research Risks Protection at 001-614-688-4792 in the United States.

I have read this form or I have had it read to me. I sign it freely and voluntarily. A copy has been given to
me.

Print the name of the participant: ____________________________________________

Date: _____________________________ Signed: ________________________

(Participant)

Signed: ___________________________ Signed: ________________________

(Principal Investigator or his/her authorized representative) (Parent or Guardian)

HS-027 (Rev. 05/01) (To be used only in connection with social and behavioral research.)

242
 THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY

CONSENT FOR FACULTY PARTICIPATION IN SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL RESEARCH

Protocol Title: A Case Study of Anatolia College: Exploring Historical Consciousness

Protocol number: 02B0126

Principal Investigator: Dr. Robert F. Lawson, Supervising Professor, The Ohio State University

Co-Investigator: Robin Giampapa, Doctoral Candidate

I consent to participating in dissertation research being conducted by Robin Giampapa of The Ohio State
University.

I agree to allow my class to be observed and/or myself to be interviewed. I understand that interviews will
only be audiotaped with my consent, and that all data gathered from the study will be kept in a secure
location with access by Robin Giampapa only. Robin has explained the purpose of the study, the
procedures to be followed, and the expected duration of my participation. Possible benefits of the study
have been described, and I acknowledge that I have the opportunity to obtain additional information
regarding the study at any time. Furthermore, I understand that I am free to withdraw consent at any time
and to discontinue participation in the study without prejudice to me.

Finally, I acknowledge that I have read and fully understand the consent form. I sign it freely and
voluntarily.

Print the name of the participant: ________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________ ________________________
Participant’s Signature Date

___________________________________________ ___________________
Principal Investigator or his authorized representative Date

The Ohio State University IRB Protocol # 02B01

243
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