This article examines the divergent historical views espoused by Russian and Ukrainian societies and their representatives on topics such as the 1932-1933 famine, Stalinism, and the post-World War II Soviet Union. We draw on an original online survey, conducted simultaneously in January 2021 in Ukraine and Russia, to provide an in-depth analysis of views on history in Ukraine and Russia before the 2022 invasion. In Russia, we illustrate how little contestation there is of official narratives. This may signal the existence of an integrated mnemonic community after a decade of state-curated historical narratives, but it might also imply that Russian society is disengaged from history. In pre-2022 Ukraine, meanwhile, we identify persistent fragmentation in the ways in which society perceives history, largely centered along the country’s linguistic divide. However, a central finding is that Russian-speakers in Ukraine differ in their historical views from Russian citizens on key dimensions such as the memory of Stalin and the Holodomor. These results speak to the evolving and politicized nature of societal memory and provide an important baseline for interpreting potential mnemonic shifts that accompanied the full-scale war launched against Ukraine by Russia in February 2022.

In the late nineteenth century, the orally transmitted Armenian legend about the folk hero David of Sassoun seemed doomed to oblivion when Ottoman Armenian clergyman Karekin Srvandzdiants published a tiny booklet containing the story that he had learned by chance. Srvandzdiants noted that he would be happy if the story could reach twenty people. Decades later, this hitherto little-known folk legend would be read, and its main heroes celebrated by tens of millions of citizens of the Soviet Union. Scores of variants of the epic were collected from all over the newly established Soviet Armenia; some of the most revered Soviet poets and linguists produced a collated text of the epic and translated it into dozens of languages. More importantly, David of Sassoun and other heroes of the epic cycle came to symbolize the newly forged Soviet Armenian national character in a vast totalitarian empire whose guiding ideology was inimical to various aspects of Armenian traditions. In this article, I examine the underlying messages of the epic, discuss how Soviet policies helped the epic captivate a large audience in a short period, and analyze the political calculations and ideological justifications behind the promotion of the epic.

In settler colonies such as the United States, Canada, Australia, and Aotearoa New Zealand, “memory wars” have, driven by conflicting narratives about colonial history, intensified in recent years. Indigenous counter-narratives challenge Euro-centric master narratives, particularly in public spaces such as museums and monuments. This article explores the impact of such conflicts on national identity, focusing on Aotearoa New Zealand, where the history of colonization has long been framed as a relatively benign process, underpinned by the Treaty of Waitangi. Through application of a comprehensive narratological framework, the article reveals how the Waitangi Treaty Grounds’ permanent exhibition, Ko Waitangi Tēnei: This is Waitangi, employs the quest masterplot to weave Māori memories of the mid-1800s New Zealand Wars into the national master narrative. The analysis highlights that this narrative emplotment – by “naturalizing” the events of the New Zealand Wars – serves to elide difficult questions about colonial violence, thus protecting the image of a tolerant and respectful nation. More generally, the article contributes to our understanding of national identity construction in the context of difficult histories, while also advancing theoretical approaches to narratology in museum storytelling.

This article shows how urban life in Seoul under the Lee Myung-bak government combines neoliberal political economy priorities with an immense accumulation of spectacles. It examines the Cheonggye stream restoration, which has been promoted as upgrading Seoul to become a cleaner, greener and competitive global city. The Cheonggye stream project points to a new form of governance which looks beyond the display of national progress through conventional museums or monumental structures, as favored by previous regimes. Instead, the progress of the city and the nation is increasingly being portrayed through the popular use of urban space.

This article aims to explicate the mechanisms underlying Poland’s support for Ukraine amid the Russian invasion by unravelling the puzzle of the swiftness, strength, and scope of Poland’s efforts, thereby challenging the latter’s potential explanations on the grounds of political realism. The authors achieve that by tapping into Ontological Security Theory (OST) and investigating how the ontological security needs of Poland, first, underpinned and directed the strategy and conduct of its security and foreign policy towards Ukraine during the first year of the war, which constituted a critical period for Poland’s national and identity security; and, second, how those needs fuel Poland’s diplomatic resolve and efforts to persuade the West to support Ukraine. This process is unpacked through an outline of the historical-cultural roots of Ukraine’s significance for Polish national identity, a review of Polish national security and foreign policy strategy documents, and an analysis of Polish political discourse regarding Poland’s national identity and Ukraine’s relevance to it. While drawing their conclusions, the authors focus on their applicability beyond the case of Poland.

In discussions on Japanese whaling, a common question is why Japan appears indifferent to international pressure (gaiatsu) on the issue, that is, why it continues to flout the international anti-whaling “norm” despite widespread criticism and condemnation. The key to answering this question is to examine why the anti-whaling “norm” resonates so poorly in the domestic sphere. This paper argues that the impotence of international pressure to curb Japanese whaling can only be understood by examining how whaling has come to be reactively defined in the domestic debate not as an issue of conservation and environmental protection but as a symbol of national identity and pride. The paper concludes that because whaling is framed as a key marker of “Japanese-ness”, international pressure is counter-productive as it merely serves to stoke the fires of nationalism, creating an atmosphere in which anti-whaling opinion is seen as “anti-Japanese”.

Through an examination of Olympic-related art and the gendered, labored bodies that produce the Olympic spectacle, “Olympic Dissent: Art, Politics, and the Tokyo Games” reveals continuities in the political and artistic stakes of the Tokyo Olympic Games in 1964 and 2020.

This article explores Japanese responses to the Syrian refugee crisis since 2011. In particular, it examines the rationales of the Japanese government and others who expressed opinions on the crisis. Since the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War in March 2011, a large number of civilians have been forced to flee their country of origin. Japan has been reluctant to accept refugees although it has pledged a large amount of financial assistance to international organizations. This article explores the rationales of Japanese responses as expressed in media texts and proceedings of the Diet and its committees, with a particular focus on issues of national identity and state identity.

This paper provides a contextualized reading of the South Korean 2016 hit drama ‘Descendants of the Sun’, the most prominent pop cultural manifestation of the Republic of Korea’s rising status as a global middle power. Through linking the fictional peacekeeping mission to a confidently nationalist conception of South Korean identity, the drama normalizes troop deployments by circumventing traditional narratives for legitimation. This argument rests on observations concerning the omission of any historical and UN context for the deployment, the Othering of the United States as main antagonist, and the unchallenged sense of righteousness and morality displayed by the main protagonists in an otherwise passive local setting.

This article describes the research on the nationalization of peasantry in Poland by the Polish sociologist Józef Chałasiński (1904–1979). He realized that the ethnicity and nation in Poland were formed with the exclusion of peasants marginalized by privileged classes. The idea of a nation was used to ensure class domination over peasants; their inclusion in the nation was tantamount to the abandonment of the peasant culture and rural lifestyle. Chałasiński described the emergence of a modern Polish nation through the popularization of the elite culture, which led to the gradual disappearance of the peasant class in Poland.

There is tension between manipulation of national identity construction and agency in the literature on ingroup identification, especially in authoritarian contexts. In China, the past is very relevant with regards to legitimacy of the Communist Party. Yet, we cannot just assume that what the state propagates is what can also be found at the bottom-up level. This article analyses social representations of history in China combining the top-down perspective of state education policies and curated historical narratives to the bottom-up perspective formed through analyzing two student surveys, collected first in 2007 and again in 2011-2012, and 11 interviews. Earlier research indicates that in most countries representations of history concentrate on negative issues and their time span is short. Chinese representations of history are divided into narratives of glory and humiliation, and respondents have a much longer perspective to national history than typical participants in international surveys. Finally, although problematic periods such as the Cultural Revolution get less coverage in political speeches and school textbooks, they are not forgotten among students. Furthermore, the view that people should have their own ideas about history and China rather than having to adopt the government promoted narrative was visible in multiple student interviews.

Anthony D. Smith, in one of his earlier, less debated, works – Nationalism in the 20th Century (1979) – examines phases of nationalism in the modern era, suggesting that nationalism has taken various forms before and during the 20th century. He argues that nationalism’s adaptability is at the core of its persistence, adapting to changing situations such as fascism and communism. As a result of this adaptability, nationalism still flourishes today. This article applies Smith’s theory to explore the interplay between cultural and material factors in the evolution of nationalism in Ireland. It identifies five ideological phases – revolutionary nationalist, protectionist, liberalising, neoliberal, and ecological – to which nationalism has adapted, and within which nationalism has influenced various aspects of Irish society. These phases are situated within a broader ideological and material context, analysing obliquely the Irish language (a core element of Irish nationalism), and related to changing processes of individualization.