A critical exploration of the ways in which national identification is discursively constructed in the Greek Cypriot system

Abstract

This thesis explores the ways in which national identification is discursively constructed in the Greek Cypriot education system. The study focuses on a set of key educational documents and a set of interviews with some significant education policy actors in Cyprus. The intention is to critically explore those discourses which constitute attempts to imagine and construct Cypriot national identity. The study is based on an assumption that while official educational policies influence the construction of national identity, these educational practices can conflict with alternative and individually-constructed discursive models of national identity. This thesis investigates the tensions between official and individual modes of identification and interprets the tensions involved in attempts to maintain and to transform Cyprus’ national identity through the Greek Cypriot educational system.
This research project adopts a qualitative design in order to explore the broadest possible range of identity constructs and their dialectical interrelations, as well as to identify in detail the recontextualisation of important concepts and arguments related to the ways in which national identification is discursively constructed in the Greek Cypriot education system. The empirical work that lies at the centre of this thesis investigates three different discursive contexts ranging from the official to the private. Specifically these are two key sets of documents: the New Curriculum, and the commemorative messages of the Minister of Education. The study also draws on the private discourse of a small number of policy actors involved in the Greek Cypriot education system, based on nine topic-oriented qualitative interviews.
The findings trace the relations between models of discursive constructs of nations and national identities illustrated in the documentary and interview analysis. The findings also indicate that different identities are discursively constructed according to the anticipated audiences, topic and substantive content. In this sense, national identities are flexible and frequently ambivalent and diffuse.

Date of Award	2018
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	King's College London
Supervisor	Meg Maguire (Supervisor) & Anwar Tlili (Supervisor)