The Useful Past in Negotiation: Adolescents' Use of History in Negotiation of Inter-Group Conflict.

Much of the concern with young people’s historical knowledge centres on factual attainment or disciplinary skills. However, relatively little attention is paid to the relevance that young people attribute to history and how they use the past, and various social representations of history, to relate to the present. Research in this realm tends to emphasize the impact of collective memory narratives on individuals, rather than individuals’ agency in using them. In this article, I will examine the ways 155 Jewish and Arab Israeli adolescents related the past to the present as they discussed the Jewish–Arab conflict and its resolution. Discussants made diverse references to the past: from family history, via biblical allusions and collective memories, to formal, schooling-based historical documents. Individuals used these references to the past to negotiate the present and future of inter-group relations. Furthermore, they made strategic use of references to others’ narratives. Thus historical knowledge and collective narratives, which are usually perceived as constraining and structuring learners’ perceptions, can be seen as repositories of resources and affordances.


Accepting all currencies: Variety of sources and epistemological tolerance
Discussantsmadeexplicitreferencestovarioussourcesofhistoricalknowledge.Inall,48of the60discussiongrouptranscriptsfeaturedatleastonetypeofthesereferences.Withineach discussion,explicitreferencestosourcesofknowledgeaboutthepastwerenotfrequent,and in most discussions (57 per cent, n=34) there were no more than one or two references. Therewasnosignificantdifferenceinthefrequencyofreferencestohistoricalknowledgeacross learningconditions.
The main findings are as follows. When relying on informal knowledge of the past, participants made references to family histories and holy texts, while reference to popular mediawasnotablyabsent.ArabparticipantsmademoreuseoffamilyhistoriesthantheirJewish peersdid,whilethelattermademorereferencestoholytextsinrelatingthepasttothepresent. Learningconditionshadcontradictoryeffectsonthefrequencyofbothtypesofreference.The role of local commemorative sites and physical remnants as connectors of past and present appeared infrequently. However, reference to the Holocaust, both as it is represented in formalknowledgeandincommemorativetripstoPoland,wasusedinmoralreasoningabout thepresent.Arabdiscussants'referencetotheHolocaustandJewishdiscussants'references to Palestinian historical perspectives demonstrated the role of engagement with the other's narrativeasagestureofempathyandreciprocity.Formalhistoryeducationwasevidentmainly inparticipants'relianceonhistoricalchartersforthedeliberationofthepresent. ArabdiscussantssharedfamilyhistoriesatamuchhigherfrequencythanJewishdiscussants(14 percent(n=11)ofallArabdiscussantscomparedwith3percent(n=2)oftheirJewishpeers (χ 2 (1)=5.24,p<.05)).Itisalsoworthnotingthatdiscussionsfeaturingfamilyhistoriesoccurred morefrequentlyinthoseconditionsoflearninginwhichdiscussantsencounteredcompeting perspectives (totalling 39 per cent (n=7) of discussions in the critical disciplinary condition, 13percent(n=2)intheempatheticcondition,8percent(n=1)inthetextbook,and21per cent (n=3) in the non-learning conditions; the difference did not, however, reach statistical significance).Allfamilystoriesboresomerelevancetothepresent,whetherthroughthesense of an ongoing trauma bearing upon the narrators' lives, or as an unfinished story in which thenarratorplayedsomepart.Sharingafamilystorymayhavealsoservedtofosterasense of intimacy between the discussants. Arab discussants referred to grandparents and parents' storiesofforceddeportationorofbeingdeceivedintotemporaryevacuationofvillages,which turnedintopermanentdisplacement.TherareJewishfamilyhistoriesreferredtoimmigration, thoughasaconsiderablylesstraumaticexperience.AsanArabdiscussanttoldhisJewishpeer: As may be noted, perhaps due to this sense of intensity and intimacy, Arab discussants attributed family histories higher reliability and authority than all other sources of historical knowledge. It is interesting that Jewish discussants seemed to treat their Arab peers' family historieswithsimilarreverenceandnotedtheiracceptanceorempathy.
Jewish majority members referred to faith-based narratives of the past more frequently thanArabdiscussants.Studentsdidnotrelatetotheacademicbiblicalhistorystudiedinsecular schools,butrathersimplyusedtheBibleasahistoricalcharter.Theyreliedondivinepromise or biblical evidence of Jewish existence in the land of Israel as warrants of the Jewish right tostatehood.Thefactthatnon-observantJewsmadeuseofreligiousreferencestothepast maypointtotheinstrumentalratherthantranscendentalroleofthesereferences.However, italsounderscorestheroleof'sacred'historyeveninsecularJewishmodernconsciousness. It is worth noting that discussants were sometimes aware that holy writ clashed with other narratives,makingitapotentiallylessusefulcharter.Thishintsthattheoptimaluseofthe'useful past'isasaconsensusbuilderoranauthoritativeargument.
Thereferencetotwomodernhistoricalcharters-theBalfourDeclarationandtheUN resolution -also underscores the role of useful past as a consensual source of authority. However, the differential preference Arab and Jewish discussants showed for each of the charters reveals the charters' changing image and influence (Hilton and Liu, 2008). In fact, it appearedtheseofficialcharters,althoughquitewidelysharedandappropriatedbyparticipants duetoformalteaching,didnotleadtoconsensus.
Acknowledgement of the Jewish narrative of suffering was offered as a gesture of intergroup empathy or goodwill. Furthermore, Arab discussants referred to their learning Jewish historyasabasisfordemandingthattheirJewishdiscussantslearnthePalestinianperspective. Similarly,someJewishdiscussantssuggestedlearningPalestinianhistoryasagesturetopromote coexistence. These instances highlight an original aspect of the 'useful past' as an asset in negotiatingthepresent.Itisnotjustthecontentofnarrativesorofhistoricalknowledgethat isusedtoshapethepresent,butalsotheactivityofknowingandlearning.Individualsofferand demandactiveacknowledgementorengagementwiththe(other's)pastaspartoftheintergroup transaction of negotiating the present. This appears to be an instance of the politics ofsocialrepresentationaswellasauniqueuseofhistoryinconflictresolution (Bar-Taland Salomon,2006;McCully,2011).
Theeducationalimplicationsofthisstudyarevaried.Ontheonehand,thefindingspoint to the rich use learners make of the historical knowledge they have acquired to negotiate conflict.Hence,theyimplythatteachinginthecontextofcontroversyandcollectivememory debateaddstotherelevanceandsignificanceofhistoryandmotivateslearnerstobuildupon theirownhistoricalknowledge.However,thefindingsalsopointtotheimportanceofschooling inimpartingsharedhistoricalknowledgethatservesasthebasisforconsensusbuilding.Such sharedconsensualknowledgemaybehardtoreachthroughtheteachingofcontroversialissues orofcriticalinquiry.Thestudyalsoimpliesthathistoryeducatorsshouldattempttobuildthe capacity of their students to engage with, or at least to acknowledge, the other's historical perspective.Suchcapacitiesmayserveasassetsininterpersonalandinter-groupdeliberation evenwhenachievinghistoricalconsensusisunlikely.

Notes on the contributor
Tsafrir Goldberg is an educational researcher and lecturer in the department of Learning, InstructionandTeacherEducationattheUniversityofHaifa,Israel.Hisresearchinterestsinclude higher order thinking in the social studies and the humanities, the relations of learning and identity,andtheimpactofhistoricaleducationoninter-grouprelations.Tsafrirtaughthistory athighschoolfor12years,hasauthoredhistorytextbooksandisanactiveteachereducator.