Back to the future : the role, challenges and agency of history teachers in Northern Ireland

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Back to the Future:

The Role, Challenges and Agency of

History Teachers in Northern Ireland

University: University of Amsterdam

Graduate School of Social Sciences Nieuwe Achergracht 166

1018WV Amsterdam

Program: MSc Conflict Resolution and Governance

Name: Lena Metko

Student ID: 11726024

First Reader: Martijn Dekker Second Reader: Sean Higgings Date of Submission: 29 June 2018 Number of Words: 26,483 words

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Abstract

Set in the nexus of conflict transformation, identity and education, this thesis critically examines the role of history teachers in post-conflict Northern Ireland in relation to conflict transformation. Based on the thematic analysis of qualitative data, history teachers in Northern Ireland are in a unique position to affect change and contribute to conflict transformation by challenging students’ perspectives, narratives and understandings of history, by showing and exploring the spectrum of social and personal identities and by transmitting democratic values. However, this potential, as well as their agency, is limited due to the challenges arising out of the minimum content provisions of the national curriculum which are counteracting the proclaimed goals of history education in Northern Ireland.

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Acknowledgements

Writing this thesis has been an intense, challenging and wonderful journey and I am grateful to the many people who have made this possible.

First and foremost, I would like to thank the teachers and student teachers who have trusted me with their stories, opened up about challenging situations and talked about both their personal and professional experiences living and working in Northern Ireland. Thank you for taking the time to be interviewed, for supporting my research and for many enlightening conversations that provided me with invaluable insights into history education, but also society, politics and life in Northern Ireland. All them are passionate and compassionate teachers and I am sure they will make an impact for generations to come.

Thank you to the countless people I met in (Northern) Ireland who were eager to share their stories with me and who made me fall in love with this beautiful country. A special thank you goes out to the staff at Lagan Backpacker Hostel in Belfast, who have made me feel like home during the five weeks of field research, have distracted me when needed, and have become friends.

Thank you to my supervisor Martijn Dekker for his support and wisdom throughout this whole process, for answering all my questions and reassuring me when I was lost, for his guidance and for giving me the freedom to follow my vision for this thesis. You were exactly the supervisor I needed to write this thesis and for that I am very grateful. Moreover, my gratitude goes out to Sean Higgins for being my second reader.

Thank you to the my fellow CRG students for making this year such an amazing experience full of laughter, food, vegan brunch, and friendship. What a year this has been!

While there are so many friends who have supported me throughout this year, I especially want to thank Natascha for giving me a home when I needed one and taking care of me. Thank you to Christof for proof-reading my thesis and making me laugh. Thank you to my best friend Käthe – our conversations kept me sane.

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1. Introduction

In the early 2000s, shortly after the Good Friday/Belfast Agreement officially ended decades of violent, identity-based conflict, the government of Northern Ireland initiated a consultation process dealing with the question of how to improve community relations and work towards “A Shared Future”. In this context, then Secretary of State, the Right Honourable Paul Murphy, stated his vision for the future of Northern Ireland’s society by saying that

we need to establish over time a shared society defined by a culture of tolerance: a normal, civic society, in which all individuals are considered as equals, where violence is an illegitimate means to resolve differences, but where differences are resolved through dialogue in the public sphere, and where all people are treated impartially (Community Relations Unit 2005: 4).

But how can that ‘shared society’ be established? How can a ‘shared future’ after decades, some might say centuries, of violent conflict between communities defined by (perceived) differences with regard to their political, religious, cultural and class background be created? How can this conflict be transformed?

When I came across this vision for the future of the country in the context of researching Northern Ireland and its education system, I asked myself how it is possible to work towards this vision of a shared future when there is no shared understanding of the past – especially considering that, as Bell et al. (2010: 5) point out, “[t]he way we think and talk about our past will impact on the way we think and talk about our future.” Focusing on the relationship between identity, history and conflict, this thesis deals with history education as one of the factors that have the potential to contribute to the transformation of conflict by transforming society and future generations. As they are the ones teaching the generations of students born after the peace agreement, history teachers are at the center of this research. The policy document mentioned above acknowledges the need to “[actively] prepare teachers and lecturers to educate children and young people for a shared society” (Community Relations Unit 2005: 35). But how? What is their role with regard to history education? What challenges do they

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encounter in their work and how they navigate them? Do they have the agency to educate students and enable them to be active participants in Northern Ireland’s shared future – and its present?

Northern Ireland provides a rich setting for examining the complex issues around education in conflict and post-conflict settings and the effects of the education system and of history education on the students, on their identity and on community relations are well-studied.2 Studying young people’s attitudes towards community relations in Northern Ireland, Kelly (2018), for example, found that 42% of respondents thought that “more needs to be done” to foster positive community relations, with 35% of respondents’ comments falling into the category “[community relations] not good, still divided.” Furey et al. (2016), for example, conducted a study comparing school settings in relation to students’ interpretations of national identity intergroup attitudes. They found that while students across five different schools do construct and interpret identity differently, there is no one school setting that is most effective in promoting social cohesion. With regard to history education, Bell et al. (2010) found that young people’s understanding of the past is largely shaped by formal education, family and community. They observed that “[y]oung people often had at best a sketchy knowledge of key events, whether these occurred during the Troubles or in the more distant past, and that knowledge was strongly influenced by their community background, and by their locality of residence” (idem: 5). Moreover, Barton & McCully (2012) researched Northern Irish students’ struggle to comprehend understand and engage with alternative historical perspectives, especially in the case of conflicting perspective encountered in school and communities. Suggesting that a neutral or balanced approach to history education does not enable students to integrate competing historical perspectives, they argue that history education should also address the affective aspects of a contentious past. However, the role of teachers, particularly history teachers, is underrepresented in these field of study and deserves specific attention, as they are in an important but difficult position. It has long been recognized that education in general, and more specifically history education, is highly political and can contribute to reconciliation and peace as well as the perpetuation of negative attitudes and conflict – a topic that is especially relevant in the context of Northern Ireland’s history of ethnic or identity-based conflict. Thus, this thesis aims to contribute to this research by focusing on the role of history teachers in relation to conflict transformation in Northern Ireland.

2_{For more, see e.g. Barton (2001); Barton and Levstik (2004); Conway (2006); Barton and McCully (2007);}

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3 1.1 Research Aim and Question

Set in the nexus of conflict transformation, identity and education, this thesis critically examines the role of history education in a post-conflict country regarding its potential contribution to conflict transformation. Considering the key position that teachers hold in any society, it is aimed at understanding the role of teachers in post-conflict settings through the specific lens of history teachers in Northern Ireland, and thus to contribute both to research in the field as well as to the development of teaching practice in Northern Ireland. This topic will be examined along the lines of the following research question:

What is the role of history teachers in Northern Ireland in relation to conflict transformation?

The following sub questions will deepen the understanding of the topic

How do history teachers interpret and perceive their role and how is it intended? How do history teachers perceive and enact their agency within the given societal and institutional setting in Northern Ireland?

What challenges do history teachers face in their work and how do they navigate them?

1.2 Outline of the Thesis

In order to explore, analyze and understand the topic of this research and answer the above questions, this thesis is structured along five chapters. After giving an overview of the background and the education system in Northern Ireland in the following two sections, Chapter 2 presents the theoretical framework which draws on research on conflict transformation, identity, agency and history education and is used to make sense of the subsequent findings. Chapter 3 provides an outline of the research design and methodology as well as reflections on practical and ethical limitations. The empirical findings from the field work in Northern Ireland will be described, analyzed and put into context in Chapter 4. Here, the focus is on the role, agency and challenges that the history teachers and student teachers, who have been interviewed for this study, have experienced in their work. Finally, Chapter 5 provides a summary of the findings, recommendations and ideas for further research as well as the conclusion of the thesis.

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4 1.3 Setting the Scene

In 1998, after thirty years of violence, over 3,600 people killed and 30,000 wounded, the period of conflict in Northern Ireland commonly referred to as the ‘Troubles’ came to an end (Fitzduff & O'Hagan 2009). Often simplistically portrayed as a religious conflict between Catholics and Protestants, the Troubles were, more accurately, an identity-based conflict between two communities with conflicting political, cultural, national and economic identities (Cairns & Darby 1998). The terms Catholic/nationalist/republican are used to refer to people who consider themselves Irish and are in favor of a united Ireland, whereas Protestants/unionists/loyalists self-identify as British and support the union with Great Britain. However, these communities are not homogenous, but rather represent a spectrum of convictions, narratives and opinions (Archik 2017).

With the Good Friday/Belfast Agreement in 1998, Northern Ireland achieved a durable, negotiated resolution to the thirty-year-long violent conflict. The situation in Northern Ireland can be defined as negative peace, meaning the relative absence of personal or direct violence, in contrast to positive peace, which is also marked by the absence of structural violence or, put positively, by social justice (Galtung 1969: 183). However, considering the situation in Northern Ireland today, social justice and positive peace have not yet been achieved and, despite a period of relative peace since the peace agreement, difficulties remain (Fitzduff & O'Hagan 2009). For example, while the level of sectarian violence has decreased compared to the height of the Troubles, in 2017, the Police Service of Northern Ireland still reported 852 incidents and crimes motivated by sectarianism (PSNI 2018: 10). Moreover, the Peace Monitor Project, which publishes benchmarks on “Northern Ireland’s journey to a post-conflict society”, chronicles the need for positive developments on issues such as gender equality, ethnicity and race relations or income equality and for structural, integrating change in the education sector (Wilson 2017: 5).

As such, the Good Friday/Belfast Agreement in 1998 established a consociational government, recognized both communities and led to the reduction of the levels of violence. Twenty years after the peace agreement, however, the country remains highly polarized in many ways. Northern Ireland’s history, as well as the perception of that history and the causes of the conflict are intricately intertwined with the narratives of the two predominant communities and revolve around a clash of two seemingly incompatible ethnonational programs (Smith 2005: 59). Identification with these deeply contested national identities defies rational argumentation, is highly emotional and thus fuels confrontation. In addition, communal division is often linked

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to symbolic displays of identity, like flags, murals and marches (McAuley 2016; McCully & Clarke 2016).

Although many aspects of life in Northern Ireland, such as neighborhoods and the education system, to a large extent remain segregated, the divide is not as dichotomous and clear as might be perceived and the attitudes and actions of both communities towards each other are just as complex as their history. This complexity, and also the dynamic nature of identity, is exemplified by the number of citizens from both communities self-identifying as Northern Irish, as revealed by the 2011 census: While 40% of respondents self-identified as ‘British only’ and 25% as ‘Irish only’, also 21% of respondents named ‘Northern Irish only’ as their national identity (NISRA 2012: 15). The prevalence of a Northern Irish identity indicates what research based on Social Identity Theory (Tajfel & Turner 1986) has established over the last three decades, namely that “individuals simultaneously hold multiple social identities depending on the role and circumstances; and they may develop new identities in response to new situations” (McCully & Clarke 2016: 359). This highlights, in turn, that while cultural identity and collective memory feel static, they are in fact dynamic and connected to the stories, legends and narratives that are being told: Put plainly, “[t]he way we think and talk about our past will impact on the way we think and talk about our future” (Bell et al. 2010: 5). As Rusen (2002: 3) states, “historical memory and historical consciousness have an important cultural function – they form identity.” Combined with research highlighting the role of formal education in challenging stereotypes and providing alternative interpretations and narratives (Barton & McCully 2007; Barton & Mccully 2012) this has consequences for Northern Ireland’s school system, especially with regard to history education and history educators.

1.4 (History) Education in Northern Ireland

Although the focus of this thesis is on history education, it is impossible to understand the relevance and scope of the topic without providing information on the education system in Northern Ireland, whose development is intricately linked to the island’s history of conflict. Therefore, the following section gives an overview of the country’s education system, the national curriculum as well the specifics of the history curriculum.

Despite a long-standing tradition of trying to bridge the divide, the education landscape in Northern Ireland is a complex and stratified system. According to the school enrolment data of the Department of Education, in the school year 2017-2018 approximately 32% of students

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attended controlled schools (with a Protestant majority),3 31% of students attended Catholic maintained schools and 10% of students attended integrated schools (both controlled integrated and grant maintained integrated schools). An additional 25% of students attended Voluntary Grammar schools and 1% of students attended other maintained (Irish-medium) schools. While the breakdown of percentages of children along the religious categories varies greatly among the respective schools, according to the available data, across all the 199 schools in Northern Ireland, 36% of children are registered as Protestant, 48% as Catholic and 11% as “other Christian/non-Christian/no religion/unknown” (Department of Education 2018).4 This divide does not only apply to students, rather, teachers mainly work in schools associated with their own identity background as well (McCully & Clarke 2016: 359). Yet, just as in areas like sports or culture, this apparent dichotomy is not as clear as it may seem.

After the partition of Ireland in 1921, a segregated school system based on religion developed, with Protestant children attending state schools and Catholic children attending schools run by the Catholic Church. This system not only reflected religious but also cultural and political identity and extended also to teacher education (Akenson 1973; Murray 1985; Farren 2012; McCully & Waldron 2013). With the outbreak of violence between the two communities in the 1960s, progressive scholars and educators began to turn towards the segregated school system as a possible factor for social and political problems and sought ways of mitigating them (Skilbeck 1976; Crone & Malone 1983; Dunn & Morgan 1999). Growing support by parents lead to the establishment of the first integrated school in 1981. In the early 1990s, the cross-curricular initiative Education for Mutual Understanding was introduced to “provide students in all subjects the opportunity to engage in ‘joint exploration and dialogue of both shared and diverse cultural traditions’” (Richardson 1992: 3 in King 2009). In addition, in 1991 the national curriculum was revised to include a more inclusive history curriculum to be taught in all schools. However, instead of further developing integrated education, the emphasis in recent years has been on the concept of Shared Education, which focuses on systematic links and common projects between schools rather than on educating children from different backgrounds in the same school.

Following the Good Friday/Belfast Agreement, which included a statement saying that “an essential aspect of the reconciliation process is the promotion of a culture of tolerance at every

3_{The Christian denomination functions as a characterization rather than an accurate representation of practiced}

faith.

4_{For more information on the different types of schools in Northern Ireland, see} https://www.nidirect.gov.uk/articles/types-school.

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level of society” (Good Friday Agreement 1998: 18), the curriculum was revised in 2007 to specify the minimum content from Foundation Stage to Key Stage 4. It aims to be

a balanced and broadly based curriculum which

(a) promotes the spiritual, emotional, moral, cultural, intellectual and physical development of pupils at the school and thereby of society; and

(b) prepares such pupils for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of life by equipping them with appropriate knowledge, understanding and skills.

(Department of Education 2007: 3)

The curriculum only provides for very broadly phrased minimum statutory requirements in relation to subject context. The flexibility inherent in this curriculum is supposed to enable schools and teachers to devise individual curricula and choose the content according to the needs and interests of their students. As such, the focus is on the development of pupils’ knowledge, understanding and skills and to develop pupils as individuals (objective 1), as contributors to society (objective 2) and as contributors to the economy and environment (objective 3). Thus, the curriculum introduced the cross-curricular theme of ‘Learning for Life and Work’ at Key Stage 3 and 4. Next to elements like Employability, Personal Development and Home Economics (at Key Stage 3), this includes ‘Local and Global Citizenship’ which is aimed at providing students with the opportunity to explore the key themes of diversity and inclusion, human rights and social responsibility, equality and social justice as well as democracy and active participation (ibid: 59-60). Inter alia, the curriculum (ibid: 59) explicitly mentions here that

“[p]upils should have opportunities to:

- Investigate factors that influence individual and group identity.

- Investigate ways in which individuals and groups express their identity.

- Investigate how and why conflict, including prejudice, stereotyping, sectarianism and racism may arise in the community.

- Investigate ways of managing conflict and promoting community relations, reconciliation.

While in Key Stages 1 and 2, the subject history is part of the bigger theme ‘The World Around Us’ (together with Geography, Science and Technology), in Key Stages 3 and 4, history is taught as part of ‘Environment and Society’. At Key Stage 3, it is obligatory for all students, whereas at Key Stage 4, students have the option to elect history for GCSE and A Level. The minimum content, however, is the same for both stages. History is supposed to contribute most to the key elements personal understanding, citizenship, cultural understanding, media awareness and ethical awareness and should make connections to the objectives of Learning for

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Life and Work. The overall flexibility regarding content is exemplified by the statutory requirements for teachers to provide pupils with, for example, opportunities to “explore how history has affected their personal identity, culture and lifestyle”, to “investigate how history has been selectively interpreted to create stereotypical perceptions and to justify views and actions” and to “investigate the impact of significant events/ideas of the 20th_{century on the}

world”, thus leaving it entirely up to the individual schools and teachers to choose the relevant content (Department of Education 2007). In relation to the history of (Northern) Ireland, the curriculum instructs history teachers to give students the opportunity to “[i]nvestigate the long and short term causes and consequences of the partition of Ireland and how it has influenced Northern Ireland today including key events and turning points”(ibid.) – which notably makes no direct mention of the Troubles. Rather, schools and teachers are given considerable leeway to interpret this requirement and to develop the content accordingly. Before, inter alia, the consequences of this curriculum for the teaching practice will be analyzed in Chapter 4, the following chapter will provide an overview of the relevant theories and concepts used as a theoretical framework for this study.

2. Theoretical Framework

This thesis is situated within a nexus of peace and conflict studies and educational research. It draws on insights from various disciplines and uses a specific theoretical framework to develop an understanding of the role, challenges and agency of history teachers in Northern Ireland. As such, despite the uniqueness in its specific manifestations, the Northern Irish context shares a lot of complexities with other post-conflict countries. The following section provides an overview of the concepts and theories that inform the data collection and analysis process and offer an overall framework for this thesis.

2.1 Conflict Transformation

In the field of conflict studies, a wide variety of theoretical and practical approaches have been developed, reflecting different paradigms, conceptualizations of peace and conflict and involving different types of intervenors. Miall (2004) distinguishes between conflict resolution, conflict management and conflict transformation and notes that, while displaying areas of overlap with regard to conflict and intervention, the three approaches differ in the conceptualization of conflict and the accompanying strategies for dealing with it. Viewing conflict as an ineradicable consequence of existing institutions, relationships and power

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dynamics, conflict management aims to constructively and appropriately handle conflict (Miall 2004: 3). Conflict resolution, in turn, focuses on enabling parties to move from destructive patterns of conflict to constructive outcomes, often through the involvement of third parties that guide the conflict parties through processes that are “acceptable to parties in dispute, and effective in resolving conflict“ (Azar & Burton 1986: 1; Miall 2004: 3–4).

Rather than trying to facilitate specific outcomes or focusing solely on an end to direct violence, the conflict transformation approach aims to transform relationships, systems and structures and to initiate change processes in order to reduce violence and increase justice long-term. In short, the goal is to “develop capacity and to support structural change” (Miall 2004: 17). Consequently, the guiding question for conflict transformation is “How do we end something not desired and build something we do desire?” (Lederach 2003: 30). Providing a lens through which to see social conflict, Lederach’s approach to conflict transformation highlights four analytical dimensions of the impact of conflict on societies: personal, relational, structural and cultural. Conflict transformation then functions as both an analytical framework and a strategy for intervention, as it can be used to understand social conflicts resulting from and producing changes in these fours dimensions as well as develop goals and ways to transform violent forms of conflict into more productive ones (Lederach 2003: 23–27). Conflict is seen as part of human relationships, which is why the idea of transformation situates conflict within a context of relational patterns. Consequently, rather than as an end state, peace is conceptualized as a process involving the continuous development and improvement of the quality of relationships through contact and dialogue on interpersonal, inter-group and social-structural levels (Lederach 2003: 20–21). As this is not a straight-forward process, education is one arena through which relationships can be developed and thus contributes to conflict transformation. Immediate issues are seen as rooted within a bigger context of patterns of structures and relationships embedded in history. Constructive change is thought to be possible through the ability to recognize, understand and redress past problems and the willingness to build new structures and relationships that look towards the future. By envisioning the future and reflecting on the levels and types of change processes, long-term change can be set in motion while also addressing specific and immediate needs (Lederach 2003: 34–39).

In protracted social or intractable conflicts, experiences of violence, conflict and hatred become part of the collective memory and the socialization process that transmits these perceptions, beliefs and narratives to new generations. As Smith (2005) explains, history and collective memory provide information about the past and influence not only the understanding of the

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present but also shape the individuals’ and groups’ perception of themselves, the other and conflicts. The resulting conflict narratives harden group identities and perpetuate conflict. Consequently, part of the conflict transformation approach is the notion of reconciliation. This political, social, cultural and educational process (and outcome) involves all societal institutions in order to foster peaceful coexistence (Bar-Tal 2000: 361). As many researchers point out, because reconciliation builds trust and fosters positive community relations, it is of vital importance both for reaching a peace settlement and for sustaining peace long-term (Marková & Gillespie 2012; Psaltis 2012). Among other factors, the education system can be used to socialize young generations to live in peace with the past enemy. Its potential to affect social change is generally accepted, yet how exactly remains a challenge, because “[w]hen identity politics has been at the heart of the conflict, the path to mutual support becomes a dance around concepts of sameness and difference” (Smith 2005: xv).

In the following, this framework will be applied to improve the understanding of the conflict and the presenting issues as well as to offer possible strategies for mitigating them. The situation in Northern Ireland today is embedded in a long history of conflict based on conflicting religious, political and national identities. On the one hand, this has created problematic structures and relationships, but on the other hand, it also holds the potential to improve them. In addition to many cross-community projects that try to foster peace through dialogue, education deserves special attention as it has long been a platform for improving relations between the communities.

2.2 Identity

Given the concept of conflict transformation outlined above, research on identity provides valuable insights into Northern Ireland and can be employed in relation to the conflict itself, but also to the role of history education and educators. As such, “[i]dentity theory is principally a microsociological theory that sets out to explain individuals’ role-related behaviors, while social identity theory is a social psychological theory that sets out to explain group processes and intergroup relations” (Hogg et al. 1995: 255). Aspects from both theoretical approaches to identity will be used in this study to examine the work and the context of the work of history teachers (related to intergroup processes) and the personal and professional challenges of history teachers within that context (related to their respective role-related behavior).

According to Social Identity Theory (SIT), social identity is built on the awareness of the membership to a certain social group, to which emotional and value significance is attached

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(Tajfel 1979b: 63). As Hogg et al. (1995: 260) point out, “each of these memberships is represented in the individual member’s mind as a social identity that both describes and prescribes one’s attributes as a member of that group.” Thus, the extent of identifying or categorizing oneself as part of a certain social group and attaching value to that membership determines how the perspectives and norms of this group are internalized and inform one’s behavior and sense of self in relation to the group (Furey et al. 2016: 140). Because social identities involve an evaluative dimension, “groups and their members are strongly motivated to adopt behavioral strategies for achieving or maintaining in-group/out-group comparisons that favor the in-group, and thus of course the self” (Hogg et al. 1995: 260). The underlying socio-cognitive process of categorization is the process of categorizing oneself and the environment into in-group and out-groups in order to understand it more easily. This can be seen as the basis for stereotyping as well as social categorization, social identification and social comparison (McCully & Reilly 2017: 207). As people derive a positive sense of belonging to the in-group, social categorization is connected to inter-group comparisons, in-group favoritism and potential out-group derogation, often connected to the perception of, inter alia, political and socio-economic power (Tajfel 1979a; Cho & Connelly 2002). Considering that social identity, as opposed to personal identity, provides the basis for the sense of self as part of a group and thus contributes to the overall sense of self, “[f]or an individual who has not developed a strong sense of self, social identity can be even more important than a sense of personal identity” (Smith 2005: 27).

However, as e.g. Furey et al. (2016: 140) point out, social identities are not static. Rather, as people can simultaneously identify as members of numerous social groups, the salience of a social identity is dependent on the situation and the context and connected to complex socio-cognitive processes. Therefore, the same social identity can inform different behavior in different contexts, thus invoking different aspects of that one social identity (Hogg et al. 1995: 265). This means, for example, that a Catholic in Northern Ireland may behave differently in their predominantly Catholic neighborhood than in the integrated school in which they work as a history teacher, all based on the same social identity.

Albeit SIT is more concerned with intergroup behavior and there are some congruencies and similarities, identity theory looks at the reciprocal relationship between individuals and society. Here, the self is viewed “not as an autonomous psychological entity but as a multifaceted social construct that emerges from people's roles in society” and the multiple components of the self are referred to as role identities (Hogg et al. 1995: 256). For example, a person’s role identities

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may include being a mother, a teacher, a historian, an educator and a Protestant. Role identities acquire meaning through social interaction, and the performance of a role and the responses to it are reflected in the self-evaluation of a person (idem: 257). Identity salience then refers to the link between role identities and behavioral and affective outcomes, meaning the likelihood of hierarchically organized role identities being invoked in different situations, thus informing behavior (ibid.). The salience of an identity is connected to the interactional and affective commitment to that role identity, namely the number and strength of important social relationships connected to it (idem: 258-259). As such, people with the same role identities may behave differently in the same context due to differences in identity salience (Callero 1985). This has several implications with regard to history education in post-conflict Northern Ireland: Not only is this relevant with regard to possible challenges that may arise out of the different role identities of history teachers, but also with regard to the strategies they choose to deal with them based on identity salience, which, in turn, also has consequences for how they perceive and enact their agency.

Research has called attention to the relationship between identity, conflict and narratives and the significance of history in relation to identity formation. History can be conceptualized as the past in general or accounts of the past, and historical memory, then, is the way individuals and society absorb and remember this past. Thus, it is critical for the creation and maintenance of identity groups, such as ethnic or religious groups as well as nations. When history functions as the frame of reference for groups or individuals, it has become a narrative (Smith 2005: 14). These stories, or myths, hold a particular significance for identity groups, regulate human action and govern features of the culture (idem: 16-18). While myths in general contribute to maintaining social cohesion within a group, in some instances, so called “origin myths” function as justification for violence in the present and future based on accounts of the past (Cobb 2003: 294). As different groups may experience history differently and different aspects of history hold different levels of salience in their historical memories, this leads to contentious historical narratives or myths (Smith, 2005: 36-37). Due to the close relationship between identity and narratives and the associated hardening of group identities, “these myths are so resistant to change and hence to conflict resolution” (Cobb, 2003: 295). Rather, they contribute to the exacerbation and perpetuation of conflict, especially when groups adopt narratives that negate each other (Smith 2005: 37).

Yet, while a society in political or social flux is particularly resistant to changing its myths and narratives, the lies, injustices and the trauma, that are often associated with them, need to be

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addressed (ibid: 32). Cobb (2003) elaborates on the potential of narrative transformation to contribute to identity transformation and, consequently, to conflict transformation. According to her, the exploration of multiple interpretations of any story through interaction allows for the development of more complex role identities in contrast to ethnic or group identities, which are often constructed as set of binaries based on flat narratives, thus moving from contentious origin myths to narratives of coexistence. Analogous to the ‘butterfly effect’ in chaos theory, she postulates that

the ‘butterflies’ let loose in a given conversation influence future conversations in ways that we cannot predict; however, as long as the elements lean in the direction of the positive transformation associated with narrative imagination or coexistence, they will have a tendency to yield positive changes over time. (Cobb 2003: 304)

To summarize, transforming the narratives on which (social) identities are based is key for transforming conflict. In this thesis, it will be explored whether history education and history teachers in Northern Ireland are able to achieve or contribute to that. First, though, the next section deals with education in the context of peacebuilding and sets out a framework for the analysis of the agency of teachers.

2.3 Peacebuilding, Education and the Agency of Teachers

While education alone cannot manage or resolve identity-based conflict, education has the potential to foster peace – and teachers can act as agents of change. Whereas for a long time, education was assumed to have an innately positive effect on conflict transformation, in their influential study on the role of education in peacebuilding, Bush & Saltarelli (2000) examined the ways education has potentially destructive or constructive impact on societies in ethnic conflicts. As such, schools can become the sights of direct and indirect violence, thus contributing to the perpetuation and legitimization of conflict, or education can function to redress these conditions. Lopes Cardozo & Shah (2016b: 517) go on to explain that “[w]hen education promotes either form of violence, the potential for it to sustain a fragile peace and meet expectations for supporting a transformative solution to society’s woes is undermined.” In the context of conflict, formal education plays an especially important role as it “can shape the understandings, attitudes, and ultimately, the behavior of individuals” (Bush & Saltarelli 2000: 9), thus putting an emphasis on teachers as part of that system. Bush and Saltarelli (2000: 23) view the role of education with regard to peacebuilding (and conflict transformation) as “to initiate or support an educational process that allows students to articulate, accommodate and

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accept differences between and within groups [...] which nurtures and constructs positive inter-group relations while marginalizing and deconstructing negative [ones].” Goals of peacebuilding education are, inter alia, the demilitarization of the mind, the problematization of taken-for-granted understandings and facts as well as the articulation of alternatives, thus opening possibilities for transformation. As Smith (2005: xv) points out, while educators are not expected to resolve or transform a conflict on their own, they do have the potential to contribute to addressing past (or present) conflicts in the realm of education and thus to societal progress.

Building on this, the Research Consortium on Education and Peacebuilding has, as part of a larger project on education and peacebuilding, conducted an extensive study on the role of teachers in peacebuilding (Sayed & Novelli 2016). They concluded that one focus has to be on the training, support and motivations of teachers for them to be able to positively affect social justice and cohesion in societies emerging from conflict, thus enabling them to become agents of change (idem: 85). Research from conflict-affected contexts, however, demonstrates that the personal and professional agency of teachers is constricted by the conditions created by conflict, which often are far from ideal (Vongalis-Macrow 2007; Lopes Cardozo & Hoeks 2014; Lopes Cardozo 2015).

In order to be able to analyze the role, challenges and agency of history teachers in Northern Ireland, I will draw on an analytical framework developed by Lopes Cardozo & Shah (2016a) for the analysis of teachers’ agency in situations of conflict in general. The Strategic Relational Approach situates actors within strategically specific contexts, in which structural and institutional conditions inform and reinforce the motivations, actions and strategies of these actors, thus creating both opportunities and constraints for action. Within this framework, agency is defined as the actors’ ‘space of maneuver’ within a given strategically selective and multiscalar context. As such, the actors may have varying degrees of potential to enact their agency by responding to and altering the surrounding structures due to varying degrees of access to particular strategic resources (Lopes Cardozo & Shah 2016b: 526). As the actors are dependent on the knowledge and understanding of and response to the environment, the conscious and unconscious actions and outcomes can vary greatly, with opportunities and constraints being unevenly distributed among actors (Hay 2002; Jessop 2005; Lopes Cardozo & Shah 2016a: 333). This also means that actors who possess more knowledge and resources than others may be more successful in realizing their preferences for actions, while others are more constraint by the structural spaces they operate in (Lopes Cardozo & Shah 2016b: 525).

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Lopez Cardozo & Shah (idem.) see this unequal access to strategic resources as being connected to social justice:

For one, actors may at the same time be differentially motivated in a desire to alter such structures, acting in ways that consciously and unconsciously serve to reproduce/transform existing conditions. Additionally, actors often lack perfect information of their context, and ‘their knowledge of their terrain and its strategic selectively is partial, at worst it is demonstrably false’. Imperfect information leads to false assumptions and actions that may appear unintentional, but are responding to a set of perceived structural constraints, which may not be perceived correctly (Hay 2002, 381–383).

Adapted and applied to the context of education, this approach means that “teachers’ exercise of agency is based on an interpretation of and reflection on their context, counterbalanced by their own value commitments, personal background and sense of professional expertise” (Lopes Cardozo & Shah 2016a: 334; Jansen 2001). Their actions are embedded in a strategically selective context, which, depending on the opportunities and constraints this context creates, gives rise to particular strategies and actions within the field of education (Jessop 2005: 49; Lopes Cardozo 2009: 412). Considering that the agency, or space for maneuver, of teachers is situated within a context of “institutional histories and cultures of practice, political or economic relations, or deeply entrenched in religious, ethnic or community-based values”, there is a difference between the potential and actual power or agency an actor possesses (Lopes Cardozo & Shah 2016b: 526).

By situating teachers within their wider cultural, socio-economic and political context, this approach contributes to a deeper understanding of teachers’ complex strategies for navigating these contexts and makes clear that the agency of teachers is not fixed but rather dependent on that same complex context in which multiple roles have to constantly be reflected on and reconciled (Lopes Cardozo & Shah 2016a: 333). This, so the researchers argue, allows them to “highlight the choices and strategies which teachers articulated to [them] and at the same time, reflect on how these actions dialectically relate to the strategically selective context [created by a specific conflict]” (ibid.). As it considers how structural and institutional conditions inform and reinforce the motivations, actions and strategies of actors, this strategic relational approach is particularly useful for this study. It provides a framework which makes it possible to relate challenges, strategies and agency of the participating teachers to the broader context of Northern Ireland’s education system and the history of protracted, identity-based conflict. Moreover, it combines insights from research on social identity and role identity with a framework of agency.

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All theories and concepts used as the theoretical framework for this study have in common that they situate the actors and their behavior in a socially constructed context and address the reciprocal relationship between actors and context. As Carr (1961: 31) notes, “[e]very human being at every stage of history or pre-history is born into a society and from [their] earliest years is molded by that society”, thus expressing the connection between history as a social process and identity formation. During or after periods of political transition or in societies emerging from violent conflict, questions of understanding and representing the past, responsibility, justice or national identity are often very contentious. According to Liu & Hilton (2005: 1), socially shared representations of history affect the formation of social identities, norms and values, which also influences intergroup behavior. Collective memories of suffering become part of group identities and, as Cole (2007: 118) points out, it is now common to ensure “politics of recognition” with regard to the nationally accepted historical narrative.

While the work of professional historians often is rather abstract, history becomes concrete in the classroom, where it has the potential to impact the popular understanding of new generations. As such, it is recognized that both formal and informal history education contribute to the construction of identity and collective memory, and thus to what Anderson (1991) called “imagined communities”. History education not only “influences public discourse, reshapes loyalties to particular social groups in a society, and develops perceptions of a shared past” (Korostelina 2008: 26), but also “promote[s] basic values and beliefs and support[s] a society’s specific view of the history of conflicts, violence, and mistrust among ethnic and religious groups” (idem: 25).

This is also the case in Northern Ireland, where there is not one, but rather two (plus x) narratives of conflict and both communities invoke their own version(s) of the past through historical narratives in order to justify attitudes and policy positions (Conway 2006: 67; Bell et al. 2010: 13). Yet, as Psaltis et al. (2017: 6) point out, “the social representations of a group or a community about the past are directly related to processes of conflict transformation and reconciliation.” Thus, there are many factors which scholars and educators consider when arguing for the importance of formal history education – e.g. the relationship between history and personal/national/ethnic etc. identity, the numerous, sometimes contradictory sources based on which students form opinions about the history of their country or the possible manipulation of history for political ends (Bush & Saltarelli 2000; Barton 2001; Barton & McCully 2007).

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Considering that historical events have a powerful contemporary significance and are interpreted differently depending on political loyalties – or rather in line with respective social identities – it is necessary to move beyond the selective exposure of family or community life and take the realm of education into account (Barton & Levstik 2004: 85). After analyzing debates around the purpose of history education and its pedagogical goals, Paulson (2015) has identified three trends. Firstly, albeit history education in many countries still transmits a linear national narrative, there has been a general shift “from indoctrination to inspiration”, which includes “more democratic teaching methods, a concern with social and economic history”, as well as the “inclusion of marginalized histories” (idem: 21). She (and other researchers) also notes a “social-sciencization” (Cole 2007: 132) of history education, meaning that in many education system, history as a subject in school is included in or combined with subjects like social studies or civic education. In addition, in the wake of globalization, the focus often is not solely on national history anymore, but rather it is taught alongside local and global history (idem: 21). Lastly, Cole identifies a third trend in what McCully (2012: 146) has coined the “enquiry-based, multi perspective approach”.

Battling with the question of how history should be taught in (post)conflict societies, McCully, who has been an essential figure in teacher training in Northern Ireland for decades and is also featured as a participant of this research, has established an approach that focuses on developing disciplinary skills and encouraging students to consider alternative, sometimes contradictory perspectives and the constructed nature of historical knowledge (idem: 148). Recognizing the relationship between historical learning and identity construction as well as the challenges this poses in a divided society, this approach pursues both intrinsic and extrinsic aims of history teaching: The intrinsic aim of transmitting historical knowledge is inherent to the subject discipline, while the extrinsic aim is focused on the broader goal of changing society (idem: 148-149). McCully sees the strength of this approach in four inter-connected areas (idem: 151-154). First, history education fosters skills that promote critical thinking, which enables students to understand the past in terms of historical knowledge and connections between past and present. Second, it emphasizes the concept of historical interpretation as a discursive and constructivist process in which multi-perspectivity serves to help students understand the connection between conflict and the complexity of interlocked and sometimes instrumentalized historical narratives. Third, alongside disciplinary skills, this approach also aims to connect formal history education with students’ lived experiences and foster ‘empathy as caring’ in order to facilitate the breakdown of emotional barriers in contested societies. Lastly, rooted in pedagogy, the curriculum and a complementary relationship with citizenship education, history

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education has the potential to convey democratic values through a focus on critical thinking skills, discursive and participatory teaching methods and an inclusion of a range of perspectives. As the relationship between history education and conflict increasingly becomes a topic of research, McCully (2012) also acknowledges the challenges teachers may be confronted with by following this approach. Teachers, too, are the product of the society which they grew up in and are a part of. Therefore, they are likely to have been socialized with many of the same preconceptions that the rest of the society has internalized and it might be difficult not only for the students but also for the teachers to reflect on and move beyond these community and family influences. In their article on history education as a means to promote positive community relations McCully & Reilly (2017: 305) aptly state that

“[t]eaching from a disciplinary base presents pedagogical challenges, and teachers have varying degrees of understanding of what is required in implementing this in practice. Apart from the challenges of dealing with contentious issues and having to take into account the potential influence of their own community allegiances, they also have to get beyond the mere transmission of historical knowledge to encourage critical thinking among their students (Smith 2005, pp. 148–150; Kitson 2007).”

At the same time, seeing as “progressive educational policy is dependent on classroom teachers for its implementation” (McCully 2012: 150), they are encouraged to enact their capacity as change agents to affect positive change. Thus, in addition to disciplinary competence, the goal of teacher education in Northern Ireland is to enable teachers to engage in a pedagogy that fosters both cognitive and affective development of their students and to confidently deal with controversial issues within the scope of history education.

These ‘varying degrees of understanding’ and the perception of the role of history teachers in Northern Ireland are essential to capture the potential of history education in post conflict Northern Ireland. Drawing on the presented theories, concepts and frameworks, I will examine how history teachers – and students studying to become history teachers – understand their role in relation to conflict transformation, how they perceive and enact their agency in the context of a society emerging from conflict as well as what challenges they encounter in relation to questions of identity, the context and the job itself and what strategies they employ to navigate these challenges.

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3. Research Design

After establishing a theoretical framework on which the then following analysis is based, this chapter on research design will show how I conceptualized and approached this task set out above. Among a short description of the research strategy, it deals with the methodology and methods used to collect, code and analyze the data which provides the empirical basis for this research.

3.1 Research Strategy

As the aim of this thesis is to foster understanding of the specific case of history teachers in Northern Ireland, most of the data has been collected through qualitative research methods, which lend themselves to this topic due to their in-depth focus on purposefully selected, information-rich and small sample sizes (Patton 1990: 169). In the initial stages of working on the thesis, I identified three sample groups that needed to be approached as respondents: history teachers, student teachers and education experts. Recognizing how influential teachers are with regard to identity formation and conflict transformation, my thesis aims to study the role and potential of history teachers, instead of the students being taught by them. In addition, I also wanted to include the perspective of student teachers since they are in the dualistic position of having attended school in the years following the Good Friday/Belfast Agreement and are preparing for a job as teachers themselves. In order to be able to place these interviews within a wider societal and academic context as well as to gather insights specific to my research topic, the perspective of experts in the fields of history education, Northern Ireland and conflict was added.

Taking into account both the segregated nature of the Northern Irish school system and the prevalence of school types outlined above, I decided to approach history teachers working in controlled schools, Catholic-maintained and integrated schools and used a combination of chain sampling and criterion sampling in order to find participants (Patton 1990: 176). After preliminary online research, I contacted the History Teachers Association of Northern Ireland (HTANI) prior to the field work and then approached possible participants based on their response to a HTANI Facebook post as well as direct referral by other participants. While the most important sampling criterion was the employment in one of those three types of schools, I also tried to ensure a range with regard to gender, years of teaching experience and location.

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In addition, again based on prior research, I contacted lecturers working in the teacher education programs of Ulster University and Queen’s University Belfast to inquire about the possibility of interviewing them as well as putting me in contact with current students in the history track of the Postgraduate Certificate in Education (PGCE) program.

3.2 Methodology

The following section discusses and reflects on the process of data collection and analysis, which is based on thematic analysis, a widely-used qualitative analysis method (Roulston 2001). When employed in a deliberate and consistent way, this approach enables researchers to identify, analyze and interpret patterns within data and thus to produce a detailed, yet complex and flexible analysis of data (Braun & Clarke 2006: 79). According to Braun & Clarke’s guidelines for conducting thematic analysis, it is necessary to explicitly discuss the underlying epistemological and ontological choices as well as the theoretical framework that inform the data collection and analysis. Themes do not just ‘emerge’ from the data and the data is not coded and analyzed in an “epistemological vacuum” (Braun & Clarke 2006: 84), but rather it is necessary to acknowledge the active role of the researcher in identifying, selecting, analyzing and reporting the given data (Taylor & Ussher 2001). Hence, the thematic analysis of this thesis is based on a constructivist perspective, viewing meaning and experience as being socially produced and reproduced, and thus situates the research within the sociocultural and structural contexts that inform the accounts provided by the participants (Braun & Clarke 2006: 85). The goal of this thesis is to provide a detailed, nuanced account of a group of themes within the data, thus focusing on specific areas of interest – namely the role, challenges and agency of history teachers in Northern Ireland and their potential to contribute to conflict transformation. A theme, in this context, is “something important about the data in relation to the research question, and represents some level of patterned response or meaning within the data set” (Braun & Clarke 2006: 82; emphasis in original).

Semi-structured interviews serve as the major source of data for this research project. This style of interviewing was chosen over a narrative or structured one because it offers an adequate balance between preparation and flexibility. Instead of going through a pre-formulated list of questions or handing off the content responsibility entirely to the respondents, I thought of initial themes relevant to each of the three sample groups (teachers, student teachers and experts) and was then able to react to the developments over the course of the respective interviews. This approach allowed me to cover similar topics with every respondent while

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giving them room to elaborate on aspects they found particularly interesting and pertinent to the topic. All interviews were conducted in English and consent was given verbally by the participants prior to the recording of the interview. I conducted six hour-long, one-on-one, in-depth interviews with history teachers and one 40-minute interview with a focus group of eight student teachers from the Ulster University’ PCGE history program. In addition, I also conducted a 1,5-hour long interview with Alan McCully, Honorary Research Fellow and former Senior Lecturer in Education at the School of Education, Ulster University, who served in a double capacity both as researcher and former teacher himself.

While the aim of the semi-structured interviews was to gain insights on the respondents’ conceptual perception related to the work of history teachers, I was also interested to explore whether there were manifestations of intersubjective differences with regard to the content of the work. In addition to asking them how they teach history, I wanted to find out how (or whether) their roles as historians, educators and individuals manifested themselves in their understanding of Northern Irish history and analyze the historical consciousness of the participants. Therefore, I asked the participating teachers and student-teachers to mark and name historical events they view as the most salient in the history of Northern Ireland on an unmarked timeline (see Appendix II). In this context, it was important to adequately explain the purpose of this ‘exploratory exercise’ and ensure that the participants understand that this is not a test of their historical knowledge but rather aimed at illustrating historical consciousness. Thus, there are no right or wrong answers and I did not expect a specific outcome. Rather, I was interested in seeing whether there are differences at all, while at the same time being aware of the limited sample size and the problem of attributing outcomes, such as a historic timeline, to certain factors, e.g. in this case type of school, religious background, etc., especially considering the small sample.

Moreover, the teachers and student teachers were asked to fill out short surveys providing information on age, self-identification, educational background as well as current employment, respectively plans for future employment (see Appendix I). On the one hand, the purpose of this was for me to be able to create a concise synopsis of the participants with information directly provided by them. On the other hand, before the field work, it was not clear how questions pertaining to identity and self-identification would be received by participants considering the contentious nature of the topic.

In addition to the interviews, relevant documents published by actors like the Department of Education or the Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment (CCEA), who deal

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with educational policy, professional development and teacher resources in the context of teaching controversial subjects and history education in Northern Ireland, have been consulted in order to provide both additional context to the interviews and a basis for further analysis. Braun & Clarke (2006: 86-93) describe six phases of thematic analysis, which guide the researcher through the process of analysis. In this context it is important to note that this is not a linear development, but rather an iterative process, going back and forth between various phases of the research. The general process, described in greater detail by the two researchers, consists of 1) familiarizing oneself with the data, 2) generating initial codes, 3) searching for themes, 4) reviewing these themes in relation to the codes and the entire data set, 5) defining and naming the themes and subthemes, and 6) producing the report which connects the analysis to the research question and the theoretical framework by developing a compelling narrative using adequate examples.

As one of the advantages of thematic analysis is its flexibility, I have adapted this method to fit this specific research question and the underlying theoretical framework. After transcribing the interviews and thus familiarizing myself with the data and developing initial ideas about the content, I used the qualitative data analysis software MAXQDA to code the interviews with the research question in mind. I was then able to group some of the codes into overarching themes pertaining to the areas of interest of roles, challenges and agency and discarded other codes. Next, looking for coherent patterns in the data, I reviewed the themes and subthemes and the corresponding data extracts both in relation to the specific themes and in relation to the data set as a whole. Here, Patton’s (1990) criteria for judging categories, – internal homogeneity and external heterogeneity, is helpful: “Data within themes should cohere together meaningfully, while there should be clear and identifiable distinctions between themes” (Braun & Clarke 2006: 91). I then proceeded to analyze the data within the themes and organized the data extracts to produce an internally consistent account of the relevant findings. Finally, these findings are discussed in relation to the theoretical framework, thus arriving at an analytical narrative which relates the empirical findings to the theory, illustrated by relevant data extracts, and makes an argument in relation to the overarching research question.

3.3 Limitations

Before presenting, analyzing and discussing the findings in the following chapter, it is necessary to reflect on the limitations of this study which mainly arise out of the choice of topic and research methods.

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Firstly, in the context of an identity-based conflict like the one in Northern Ireland, factors like age, gender, teaching position as well as religious and political affiliation are especially important with regard to both the professional and the personal identity of the participants. I have made a conscious effort to take these factors into account and include a wide range of participants, while keeping in mind that “[i]nsofar as meaning, attitudes, and even knowledge do not reside with individuals but are constituted in social situations, then we should be sampling from a population of social situations and not a population of individuals” (Burawoy 1998: 12). Some teachers are Heads of Department, others have temporary positions, some taught most of their career in one school, others have taught in a variety of different places, some work in Belfast, others in more rural settings, and they represent a broad spectrum of political and religious views that reflect the general population in Northern Ireland. However, they are all either involved in the HTANI or were referred to me by other teachers through a network of professional contacts and might therefore be more likely to reflect on the personal and professional implications of their job even outside the given research setting. Thus, as one teacher put it, I was “talking to the committed”5_{and I cannot rule out that the experiences of}

the involved teachers differ from those of others. As such, the participants are diverse in their personal and professional biographies and experiences, the data exhibits recurring patterns, similarities and overlap and the data has been triangulated with an expert interview and an interview with a group of 8 student teachers. While due to the sample size this research cannot be representative of the entire teaching community in Northern Ireland, it contributes to the understanding of the role history education and the potential of history teachers in relation to conflict resolution. Thus, it needs to be seen as a contribution to the wider spectrum of literature on this topic and understood within this context.

Another limitation is connected to the view of history as a social process, which involves the selective interpretation of the past by individuals. As Carr (1961: 79) writes, “historical facts presuppose some measure of interpretation and historical interpretation always involves moral judgements.” Thus, just as much as the participants have their interpretations of history, so do I interpret and understand the history and the stories presented to me in a particular way. Conducting and analyzing qualitative interviews always carries the risk of being biased, consciously and unconsciously. Being aware of this risk or limitation, it was necessary to not only take the identity background of the participants into account, but also reflect on my own

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