Teaching the violent past: history education and reconciliation

During an armed conflict or period of gross human rights violations, the first priority is a cessation of violence. For the cease-fire to be more than a lull in hostilities and atrocities, however, it must be accompanied by a plan for political transition and social reconstruction. Essential to this long-term reconciliation process is education reform that teaches future generations information repressed under dictatorial regimes and offers new representations of former enemies. In Teaching the Violent Past, Cole has gathered nine case studies exploring the use of history education to promote

Introduction: history education and sociopolitical reconciliation / Elizabeth A. Cole -- As generations pass: the challenges of long-term reconciliation in history textbooks -- The trajectory of reconciliation through history education in post-unification Germany / Julian Dierkes -- Teaching the Pacific War in Japanese secondary schools / Takashi Yoshida -- Canadian history textbooks and the portrayal of Canada's first nations / Penney Clark -- Reconciliation in process -- History teaching and reconciliation in Northern Ireland / Alison Kitson -- The civil war and Franco dictatorship in Spanish secondary school history textbooks / Rafael Valls -- Education and the politics of history in Guatemala: integrating "memory of silence" into the curriculum? / Elizabeth Oglesby -- Reconciliation jeopardized, undone or not yet attained: aspirational and counter-reconciliatory cases -- Secondary school history texts: the case of Russia / Thomas Sherlock -- From confrontation to cooperation in the two Koreas: the role of history education in promoting reconciliation / Roland Bleiker -- History education and reconciliation issues in contemporary India and Pakistan / Thomas Sherlock and Jon Dorschner -- Afterward / Audrey Chapman -- Contributors