The Politics of History in Bangladeshi History Textbooks
Cecilia Mo, Professor
Political Science
Closed. This professor is continuing with Fall 2023 apprentices on this project; no new apprentices needed for Spring 2024.
This project examines of how official narratives of Bangladesh’s 1971 Liberation War in national social studies textbooks have shifted over time. Since independence, history textbooks in Bangladesh have been sites of contestation, undergoing politically motivated revisions with each new regime that has come into power. With the goal of examining these changes and the effects they have had on the Bangladeshi population, this study includes three levels of analysis: (1) an institutional analysis, which uses process tracing to consider the impact of the actors and institutions who develop curricula and textbooks; (2) a textual analysis, which employs content analysis and quantitative textual analysis to dissect the narratives of the 1971 Liberation War in Bangladeshi social science textbooks and curricula from 1972 to the present; and, (3) an impact analysis, which uses in-depth interviewing, classroom visits, and focus groups to identify the ways that textbook narratives do or do not affect individuals’ lasting views on the 1971 War.
The study utilizes an original data set collected over the course of a year of fieldwork—including over 30 school visits, 150 curricular documents, and 100 interviews across Bangladesh’s seven districts—and proposes fielding a nationwide survey that includes an experimental design as part of the impact analysis. Through these analyses, this work seeks to provide a comprehensive analysis of an evolving narrative over the course of a country’s history, insight into how official narratives are used as tools for political legitimacy, and how politicized revisions impact public perceptions of what it means to have a “true history.”
Role: Students will be asked to:
- translate and prepare textbook narratives and interviews for analysis;
- analyze/code textbook narratives and interview transcripts for emerging themes;
be in regular contact with supervisor, Elizabeth Herman, with any issues, questions, and/or concerns;
- participate in brief, 30 minute weekly calls to conduct research training, address questions, discuss ongoing work, and review findings with research supervisor.
Students will develop the following skills:
- conducting quantitative and qualitative data analysis;
- constructing survey research designs;
- completing basic programming in R.
Qualifications: - As many texts are in Bangla, fluency in Bangla strongly preferred (please describe your proficiency with Bangla in your applications);
- Students should be detail-oriented, organized, and self-motivated; interested in the research areas of politics of history, national identity, and/or collective memory;
- Experience with programming is a plus, but not required.
Hours: 6-8 hrs
Off-Campus Research Site: All meetings will take place remotely.
Social Sciences