The National Struggle Museums of a divided city

Abstract

The article compares the two National Struggle Museums situated on either side of Nicosia, the divided capital of Cyprus. Their differences, it is suggested, reflect the differences of Greek and Turkish nationalism while their similarities are an outcome of their sharing the same form of historical representation: the past as a narrative of national struggle. The structural similarities of the two museums are thus utilized in order to highlight the specific 'syntax of narratives of national struggle, as well as to discuss some of their implications for multi-ethnic states in which the past is primarily conceptualized in this way. It is suggested that the notion of the nation as an imagined community should be supplemented by a notion of the nation as the central actor and moral centre of a historical narrative that gives meaning to the past and indicates future orientations. © 1994, Taylor & Francis Group, LLC. All rights reserved.