Education Commons^™

History Textbooks And The Construction Of National Identity In Burma, Ada Chai

Senior Theses and Projects

Political leaders have often used state education systems as a tool for nation building, using school curricula to shape citizens’ national identity to be consistent with their long-term political goals. In this paper, I analyze the narratives of past kings in government-issued history textbooks in Burma examine the political and social values the Burmese State attempts to transmit to students in the process of building a national identity. Using a qualitative content analysis and coding methods, I examine 6^th – 8^th grade history textbooks. My findings indicate that the Burmese State uses narratives of ancient Burmese kings to …