Roundtable participant

• In Event: “Does history education really matter for conflict resolution and stability?: Authors meet practitioners”

Abstract

**Please note this is a proposal for roundtable but there is not a separate form for roundtable proposals on the online system. In lieu of paper abstracts, here are the participant bios/what they will contribute to the discussion:

Dr. Williams’ recent edited book, (Re)Constructing Memory: School Textbooks and the Imagination of the Nation, examines changes in textbooks during periods of rapid social, economic and political change in eleven national contexts. The book considers ways in which school textbooks are used: to shore up the state when state legitimacy is challenged; to explain internal and external conflict; and to (re)create a national identity when external conditions supporting an initial conception of the state shift. Textbooks are used in different ways to describe narratives of national identity and character. Most nations balance the teaching of heritage versus history, national pride versus critical thinking, positive identity and difficult past.

Author

• James Williams, George Washington University