Ruptured imaginings amid emerging nationhood: the unsettled narrative of “unity in resistance” in South Sudanese history textbooks

Abstract

This article explores the place of history education in state-sponsored nation-building in war-torn South Sudan, the world's youngest country. It examines discourses around nationhood transmitted via the first history curricula, textbooks and teacher guides issued in the midst of civil war, after the country's secession from Sudan to its north. The analysis uncovers a central memory of violence and an ostensibly unifying narrative of the South's historical victimisation and struggle. An emerging emotionally charged discourse of “unity in resistance” illustrates the construction of a “usable past” through silencing and othering. Its offshoot is an unsettled narrative whose key focus on unity undergoes repeated rupture.