PAPADAKIS-cyprus American Ethnologist PDF

Greek Cypriot Narratives of History and Collective Identity: Nationalism as a Contested
Process
Author(s): Yiannis Papadakis
Source: American Ethnologist, Vol. 25, No. 2 (May, 1998), pp. 149-165
Published by: Wiley on behalf of the American Anthropological Association
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/646690
Accessed: 08-07-2019 08:10 UTC
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms
American Anthropological Association, Wiley are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize,

preserve and extend access to American Ethnologist
This content downloaded from 146.96.128.36 on Mon, 08 Jul 2019 08:10:57 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Greek Cypriot narratives of history and collective
identity: nationalism as a contested process
YIANNIS PAPADAKIS-University of Cyprus
Cyprus does not belong to the Cypriots.... Cyprus belongs to the whole of Hellenism.
-C. Spyridakis, minister of education in Cyprus, January 14, 1968
Cyprus belongs to its people.
-Greek Cypriot slogan used during mass protests after the Greek
and Turkish interventions of July 1974
To whom does Cyprus belong, then? One could try to answer this by first answering the
related question "Where does Cyprus belong?" or even the simpler "Where is Cyprus?" Yet not
even these questions may be easy to answer. Cyprus is positioned differently on the maps of
Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot official publications; geographically it is "stable," but
semantically it "floats" closer to either Turkey or Greece respectively. On a map on the back
cover of a Turkish Cypriot publication (North Cyprus Almanac 1987), Cyprus is depicted as
lying off the coasts of Turkey, Syria, and Egypt: the vertical dimension is dominant in this map.
On a map distributed by the Greek Cypriot Public Information Office, a small insert depicts
Cyprus's position in the eastern Mediterranean.1 In this case the horizontal dimension is
dominant and the map stretches from Cyprus on the right far enough to the left to include some
of the Greek islands. In the standard map used in schools throughout Greece and by Greek
Cypriots the problem of distance between Greece and Cyprus is resolved by placing Cyprus in
a box at the bottom right-hand side of the map, thereby positioning it alongside Crete. In Turkish
and Turkish Cypriot histories of Cyprus, by contrast, the island is frequently introduced by a
note that geologically Cyprus "belongs" to Turkey.2
In this article I consider the appeal of "grand" historical narratives of nationalism

by focusing on the ways in which history and identity are contested in the context
of Greek Cypriot society. I pay particular attention to diverse expressions of
nationalism formulated by the state, political parties, and individual social actors.
By examining how nationalism is articulated on these different levels, I propose an
understanding of the dialectical process between "above" and "below" that
accounts for the appeal of specific constructions of nationalism. I investigate this
process by looking at how individual social actors discuss the past in ways that
blend elements of personal, local, and national political history. Such an approach
provides an alternative to theories that hold that nationalism's appeal lies in
proposing a new kind of community as the local community collapses under the
dislocating impact of the forces of modernity. In contrast, theories of nationalism
phrased in terms of broad cultural ontologies are problematic for explaining the
presence of multiple models of nationalism within a community, and the ways in
which nationalisms can be internally contested. [nationalism, history, identity,
narrative, Cyprus]
American Ethnologist 25(2):149-165. Copyright ? 1998, American Anthropological Association.
Greek Cypriot narratives of history and collective identity 149
Anthropologists also express ambivalence about where to "place" Cyprus, as the title of the
publication Regional Variation in Modern Greece and Cyprus: Towards a Perspective on the
Ethnography of Greece (Dimen and Friedl 1976) suggests. This title converges terminologically
with the standard map of Greece used in Greek schools but neither is semantically transparent:
two of the contributors disagree over where Cyprus belongs. Peristiany points out that "culturally,
Cyprus is for me part of the Greek world" (1976:344), while Loizos argues that "to attempt to
classify Cyprus sociologically as a 'region' of Greece is to follow a line of non-thought that
concludes that the Turkish minority had no rightful place in the 1960 independent republic"
(1 976:361).
Maps, as Anderson points out (1991:1 70-1 78), are fundamental mechanisms for conceptu-
alizing territoriality, and thus constitute one of the primary tools of nationalist symbolism.
According to de Certeau the map may also be treated as a "stage" or a "theater" delimiting what
is to count as an area of legitimate actions (1984:121-123). Modern maps, argues de Certeau,
can be treated as rhetorical tropes aimed at constructing a totalizing stage-just as, I would add,
nationalist discourses allude to total homogeneity and universal acceptance. I suggest that
perhaps nationalist discourses and maps must both do so because neither remains uncontested.
theoretical considerations
In this article I trace the emergence and illustrate the articulation among Greek Cyp
two major paradigms of nationalism that contest the relationships among people, p
history on which nationalism is predicated. I propose to understand the appeal of nati
by focusing on the dialectical interaction between the abstract narratives proposed by
parties (as elements of social structure) and the narratives proposed by their followers
agents). The main question I pursue is that of how personal and local history become ine
linked with the more abstract formulations proposed by the political parties. Thu
analytical priority neither on the level of agent nor on that of structure, but rather
interactions. One of the most interesting studies that explores how nationalism em
dialectically through the interaction of "above" (the state) and "below" (the people) is K
comparison (1988) of Australian and Sinhalese nationalisms. In this study Kapferer sho
state rhetoric manipulates popular values to transform everyday "legends of people" int
of state." He presents his argument (1988:3-4) as a critique of general theories of natio
that find little of interest in the examination of the particular forms that nationalism ass
uses comparative data to illustrate the proposition that nationalism is not a sui g
phenomenon but is adapted in and expressed through local idioms. Different socie
what Kapferer terms "diverse ontologies" that permit the expression of diverse f
nationalism-such as, for example, those of hierarchical Sinhalese nationalism and eg
Australian nationalism (1988:79-84).
Spencer has criticized Kapferer's use of the concept of ontology on the grounds that it implies
dangerous generalizing and collectivizing tendencies-the very basis of nationalism (Spencer
1990b:288-290).3 Nevertheless, if Kapferer links nationalism to the concept of cultural ontology
in order to show that nationalism is far from uniform, Spencer goes to the other extreme. Echoing
a number of other theorists (such as Giddens 1985; Hobsbawm 1990:1 70-173), Spencer argues
that nationalist discourse derives its force by positing a "national community" that comes to
replace the local community as the latter disintegrates under the strains of modernity (Spencer
1990a:238, 253, 1990b:287). I find this point equally problematic because it cannot explain
why one kind of national community (with its associated symbols and historical narratives) is
chosen over another. Moreover, it does not adequately explain an issue that is fundamental to
well-rounded theories of nationalism: how nationalism relates to people's experiences, fears,
and expectations. In this article I attempt to address such concerns neither by embracing an
150 american ethnologist
explanation in terms of social disorientation and the "loss of local community" nor by positing
a homogeneous shared vision of nationalism emerging out of a cultural ontology.
The same problem can be approached from a different angle. To argue, as many theorists
critical of nationalism do, that the history nationalists propose is more akin to myth (Anderson
1991:198-206; Gellner 1983:124-125; Hobsbawm 1992:3; Smith 1991:viii) only begs the
question of how such narratives of the past gain their appeal in the first place. Similarly, to posit
that nationalism is primarily articulated from above, as Gellner (1983) implies and as Anderson
(1991:83-11 1) argues for 20th-century "official nationalisms," is to miss a significant part of the
picture. Smith, who criticizes such approaches as unable to account for nationalism's popularity
and as neglectful of grassroots beliefs and feelings, argues that modern nations are often built
on preexisting ethnies, or ethnic cores (i.e., premodern communities with a sense of solidarity
and a set of shared beliefs and myths) (Smith 1991:37). But this type of argument is unproductive
as well because it, too, implies the existence of ontology for nationalism-and thus raises the
problems previously noted.
Instead, I take a middle-ground approach in this article by focusing on how nationalism is
internally contested among Greek Cypriots. I outline two models of nationalism: the "Greek"
model, associated with DISI (Dhimokratikos Sinayermos [Democratic Rally]), the largest
right-wing party, and the "Cypriot" model, endorsed by AKEL (Anorthotiko Komma Ergha-
zomenou Laou [Party of the Uprising of the Working People]), the major left-wing party. After
presenting some general historical background, I will examine the two parties' positions. Then
I will consider how individual supporters of these parties comment on the island's history and
on the identity of Greek Cypriots, and how they come to link such "grand narratives" with local
and personal history. One of the key themes in this discussion concerns the ways in which such
narratives express self-justification and assign blame to other agents. Self-justification and
blaming others, I argue, are elements of fundamental significance in the articulation of
nationalist narratives, particularly in a situation that all participants acknowledge as problematic
and that has been presented, since the 1950s, by both insiders and outsiders as "the Cyprus
Problem" (to Kypriako Provlima). Debates about history and identity in Cyprus explicitly or
implicitly mention the Cyprus Problem and thereby attempt to provide explanations for what
took place, highlight the causes of misfortune, and apportion blame.
the Cyprus problem
Cyprus, an eastern Mediterranean island, emerged as an independent state in 1960 after a

five-year (1955-60) Greek Cypriot armed struggle for enosis (union with Greece) against the
British colonial authorities. Before the emergence of the armed struggle, Greek Cypriot internal
political life was dominated by conflicts between the forces of the communist Left and groups
of the Right allied with the church. The (Greek Cypriot) Communist Party, AKEL, which was
and is still a significant political force, initially expressed doubts about the timing and form of
the struggle and was excluded from the effort. AKEL members were branded as traitors,
threatened, and, in several cases, killed by supporters of EOKA (Ethniki Orghanosi Kyprion
Aghoniston [National Organization of Cypriot Fighters]). EOKA's political wing was led by
Archbishop Makarios and its military section by General Grivas, a Greek Cypriot with a fierce
anticommunist record from the Greek Civil War. At the same time, the Turkish Cypriots, the
island's most significant minority (18 percent), began voicing their own demands for either the
division of the island (taksim)or its return to Turkey, its previous ruler. The British hired Turkish
Cypriot policemen, who were employed against the Greek Cypriot EOKA insurrection. This led
to interethnic killings and, in consequence, in 1958 riots and armed interethnic confrontations
broke out (Pollis 1979). As a response to EOKA, Turkish Cypriots established their own fighters'
organization in 1957 under the name of Turk Mukavemet Teskilati (Turkish Resistance Organi-
zation), or TMT.
In 1960 the two ethnic groups in Cyprus nominally accepted an independence document
drafted by Britain, Greece, and Turkey; these states were to act as guarantor powers of the
sovereignty and territorial integrity of the new state. Nevertheless, during the 1960s, Cyprus
witnessed more protracted interethnic fighting, primarily in the years 1963-64 and 1967. The
Turkish Cypriots, the weaker side, suffered the greater losses. Many abandoned their homes and
moved to areas that gradually became armed enclaves under their control (Patrick 1976).
The rise in 1967 of a military junta in Greece had significant repercussions in Cyprus. As the
interethnic fighting of 1963-67 subsided, Greek Cypriots became deeply divided between those
arguing for enosis now, a position that received much ideological and practical support from
the Greek junta, and others favoring enosis if possible in the future (Loizos 1974:125) who
viewed the prospect of union with a fascist regime unfavorably. Throughout the 1 960s and until
his death in 1977, Archbishop Makarios was president of the republic in a paradoxical alliance
with the communists of AKEL. Although he clearly disliked the Greek junta and its attempts to
dictate policies for Cyprus, he was also distressed by the internal territorial divisions created by
the Turkish Cypriot enclaves. Makarios thus adopted a policy that gave priority to the solution
of these internal problems within the framework of an independent Cypriot state. As for enosis,
both Makarios and his allies, including the communists of AKEL who would have lost much
ground if Cyprus had joined the fascist and avowedly anticommunist regime of Greece, argued
that although ideally enosis may have been desirable (efkteo), it was clearly not a realistic goal
(efikto) at the time. Out of those strongly in favor of enosis, the paramilitary organization EOKA
B emerged. This group was actively supported by junta-appointed officers in the Greek Cypriot
army and led by General Grivas, the previous coleader of EOKA who had subsequently turned
against Makarios.4 Members of EOKA B proclaimed that their aim was to complete the job of
EOKA-that is, bring about enosis, the objective that Makarios and his communist allies were
now said to have betrayed. During the early 1970s, EOKA B, with the support of the Greek army
officers, launched a campaign of killings, violence, and intimidation against the government
and AKEL that culminated in a coup in 1974. Turkey reacted by launching a military offensive
that resulted in heavy Greek Cypriot casualties and completely separated the two sides. The
upstart regime immediately collapsed and Makarios was reinstated. Negotiations for a federal
solution continue to this day.
Greek Cypriots emerged from these events still more dependent on Greece, which soon
reverted to a democratic government and was their only ally in the arena of international politics
in general and in the European Community in particular. Greece is also the state on which rest
vague Greek Cypriot hopes for the protection of Cyprus from a further Turkish offensive-a
primary Greek Cypriot fear, especially given the presence and strength of the Turkish army in
Cyprus. Regarding the Turkish Cypriots, Greek Cypriots adopted a policy of rapprochement,
expressed as the post-1974 major political doctrine of epanaprosegisi, meaning "coming
together again." Greek Cypriots thus began to appeal to a previous state of coexistence in order
to justify their vision of a united Cyprus cohabited by the two ethnic groups and to counter
official Turkish Cypriot claims that the history of relations between Greek Cypriots and Turkish
Cypriots is one of pure conflict (thereby proving that they can never live together).
To recapitulate, the Cyprus Problem as Greek Cypriots understand it necessitates the
following: (1) the end of Turkish occupation and the reunification of the island with the help of
Greece and (2) persuading Turkish Cypriots to accept a joint state by means of expressions of
goodwill through actions promoting rapprochement. The dilemma of the Greek Cypriot identity
can be presented schematically in Figure 1.
On the one hand, Greek Cypriots' dependence on Greece and belief in their Greek origins
and cultural heritage requires emphasis on the "Greek" aspect. On the other hand, the need for
Turkish Greek Greek
Cypriot Cypriot
Figure 1. The dilemma of Greek Cypriot ident
rapprochement with the Turkish Cypriots leads to

dimension. In effect, this means Greek Cypriots mus
on a continuum between an exclusively Greek and a
The resulting ambivalence emerged in a radical form
desire for incorporation within the Greek state w
unfulfilled dream that was, according to Markides (19
realities forced Greek Cypriots to articulate their des
the reunification of the island. Attalides, who points to
1974 (Attalides 1979:57-79), acknowledges that thes
expressed as a political ideology" (1979:59), becaus
competing with each other in their use of symbols
After 1974, however, the gradual official introducti
those of "Greekness" became more noticeable and
presented in Figure 2, a relative shift toward the Cy
double-talk reflecting the ambivalence just described
level of state symbols is found in the simultaneous use
anthem. In another example, whereas Greek flags w
Cypriot flag was added at school buildings as well as
were flown together on all national holidays.
political part
In this section I present the views of the two largest G

DISI. During the past 23 years each party has control
votes. In terms of the central dilemma, AKEL support
the "Cypriot" side, while DISI supporters align thems
I focus on these two parties, not only because most of
supporters, but also because, for the purposes of this
Their history is important for understanding the posit
The most detailed overview of the history of AKEL i
claims that AKEL, founded in 1941, was not very succ
(1971:44), yet AKEL was successful in creating the str
institutional interethnic cooperation took place (At
was the only party that did not describe itself as nation
did not have a monopoly over patriotism (Loizos 19
for Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot workers to u
Cypriot Greek
Figure 2. Parameters of Cyp
Greek Cypriot narrativ
more pragmatic basis, the capitalist class at home. AKEL's stance on the issue of enosis has been
ambivalent as AKEL leaders tried to capitalize on the emotional power of this slogan while
simultaneously worrying about the persecution of the Left in Greece. In addition, these leaders
were excluded from the EOKA struggle and were deemed to lie outside the domain of the
dominant symbolic values of Greek identity (the "Hellenic-Christian" ideals) on the grounds
that "atheist communists could not be Greeks" (see Loizos 1975:129). AKEL's ambivalence
about enosis prompted supporters of the Right to advance charges of "political opportunism"
(Adams 1971:4-5, 38-42). Because AKEL supporters did not participate in either the EOKA
fighting or the interethnic conflict during independence, AKEL emerged as the major political
group in Cyprus that abjures the use of violence (Adams 1971:124-125, 149-152; Rudolf
1980:226). The conflict between AKEL activists and the nationalists of the Right, ranging from
open mutual intolerance to violent attacks and killings of left-wing partisans by extreme
nationalists, beginning with the creation of EOKA and through the 1974 division, provides one
of the dominant strands of modern Cypriot history (see Attalides 1979; Kitromilides 1981).
To date, there is no comparable study of DISI, a party that emerged in 1976 as an amalgam
of previous parties of the Right that had formerly competed with each other on a pro-enosis,
pro-Hellenism platform.6 In popular discourse, DISI has been described as the party ofthe "most
conservative and right-wing elements" (Coufoudakis 1983:115) and is often accused by all other
parties of "having provided a roof for the EOKA B organizers of the coup" (see also Papaioannou
1984:25, 27). It was the only party that did not hold any commemorations of the coup;
supporters argued that it was best to forget the coup, as it was a source of internal discord. This
policy continued after DISI came to power in 1 993; for the first time, the annual commemoration
of the coup and invasion did not receive official sponsorship, although public recognition was
organized by the other parties. DISI members also argued that blame should not be assigned to
participants in the 1974 coup, and one of the party's first official acts was to reinstate the
notorious "62"-that is, the 62 individuals who were dismissed from the government because
of their collaboration with the coup participants. In the same year, the commemoration of the
death of General Grivas received official state and church sponsorship for the first time. DISI
has also pushed for the renovation of the Greek Cypriot Museum of National Struggle (currently
under way), as a memorial to the EOKA struggle.
DISI leaders advocated the need to cement unity with Greece through the institutionalization
of a Pannational Assembly (Panethniki Dhiaskepsi) where the government and political parties
of Greece and the Republic of Cyprus could occasionally meet and make joint decisions on
"national issues." Unity with Greece has also been promoted as a means of creating a common
defense against Turkey. This effort prompted the two governments to sign a "Declaration of
Common Defense Space." DISI has also periodically raised the issue of stationing a Greek army
contingent in Cyprus. DISI's appeals to unity clearly allude to unity among Greek Cypriots and
between Greek Cypriots and Greeks. The argument of DISI members that it is best not to dwell
on the coup may thus be seen as an implicit effort to absolve the coup participants of blame,
as well as an attempt to prevent both internal divisions among Greek Cypriots and external
divisions between Greeks and Greek Cypriots. As Stamatakis argues (1991:69-70), Greek
Cypriots often present the coup, which was inspired by the Greek officers of the junta, as the
epitome of betrayal by Greece. Similarly, emphasis on the "Turkish threat" or the Turkish attack
and its consequences can be understood as a parallel strategy of diverting attention from the
coup (Loizos 1981:133).
The one word in Greek that best encapsulates a sense of national unity is Hellenism
(Ellinismos), a term that DISI uses in placing Greek Cypriots collectively under the label of
"Cypriot Hellenism" (Kipriakos Ellinismos).7 The concept of Hellenism first emerged during the
19th-century Greek campaign to resurrect the Byzantine Empire, known as the Meghali Idhea
(Great Idea). It encapsulated three aspects of unity: (1) the synchronic unity of people in space
as members of the same nation; (2) the diachronic unity of the narrative of Greek history from
the classical glory of the ancients through the grandeur of the Byzantine Empire and the modern
state; and (3) the concomitant unity of the core values of Greek national identity as "Hellenic-
Christian" (Dimaras 1985:325-419). This concept thus provides not only a commentary on
collective identity by including Greek Cypriots within the romantic eternal domain of Hel-
lenism, but also a statement regarding what should count as the relevant history. This idea of
appropriate history corresponds to the dominant paradigm of Greek history, in which "Turks"
appear as the archenemies who have reduced the "Greek" domain from its Byzantine expanses
to its current small territory and have divided Cyprus itself. DISI supporters exclusively use the
Greek flag, while AKEL supporters exclusively use the Cypriot flag. The different uses of these
flags provide opposed symbolic statements of adherence to political parties, historical narra-
tives, and collective identities.
In contrast to DISI, AKEL treats Grivas as a traitor and insists that the coup should not be
forgotten and that the culprits should be punished. Because AKEL supporters were among the
prime targets of the coup participants and EOKA B, this policy is understandable, particularly
since it provides a continuous source of criticism against DISI. The response of DISI members
is to accuse AKEL supporters of creating internal divisions to further their own party interests.
But AKEL followers are also interested in unity, albeit of a different kind: unity among all
Cypriots. AKEL policy discourse explicitly avoids the use of "Hellenism" but instead uses the
term Kypriakos laos (Cypriot people), which hypothetically can include Turkish Cypriots (see
AKEL 1991). When there is a need to refer specifically to Greek Cypriots, the term Ellinokiprii
(Greek Cypriots) is used. AKEL members oppose both high-level discussions between the Greek
Cypriots and Greece and the expansion of Greek army units, as these actions could further
alienate the Turkish Cypriots. The term Cypriot people alludes to a different historical para-
digm-that of a specifically Cypriot history, which is one of "traditional coexistence" between
Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots and in which AKEL's role in fostering interethnic coopera-
tion has been paramount. According to AKEL, this state of traditional coexistence was destroyed
by the actions of right-wing nationalists of both sides, along with the actions of Greece, Turkey,
and other foreign powers.8
To underscore its symbolic positions, AKEL sponsors annual commemorative rituals, such as
the Commemoration of Kavazoghlou ke Mishaoulis. This was the 1965 joint killing in which
right-wing activists targeted two left-wing journalists, one of whom was Turkish Cypriot and the
other Greek Cypriot, who were friends. DISI similarly organizes commemorative rituals that
correspond to its own historical imagination. The youth branch of DISI, NEDISI (Neolea
Dhimokritikou Sinayermou [Youth for Democratic Alert]), organizes the yearly Commemora-
tion of Smirni in observance of the 1 922 Turkish defeat ofthe Greek army, which was attempting
to implement the Megali Idea, and the subsequent destruction of Smirni (izmir) by the Turkish
army. NEDISI also organizes a yearly commemoration for the 1453 fall of Constantinople to the
Ottomans. Thus, while DISI draws its symbolic capital (Bourdieu 1989:171-183) from the
history of Hellenism, AKEL uses the prevalent notion of rapprochement to argue that this is what
AKEL has been promoting all along.
Anderson has argued that politically motivated historical accounts transform "contingency
into meaning" (Anderson 1991:11). AKEL presents its past position and actions (for example,
its periodic links with Turkish Cypriots, its ambivalence on enosis, its nonparticipation in armed
fighting, and its exclusion from the use of a rhetoric of "Hellenic-Christian ideals"-a rhetoric
that AKEL members dislike because it is the rallying cry of its internal rival) as self-consciously
patriotic and draws support for this image by appealing to a popular desire for rapprochement,
independence, and the reunification of Cyprus. DISI equally reifies history as the eternal conflict
with and march of the Turkish aggressors by appropriating the dominant paradigm of Greek
history that allows it to discount the significance of the coup and to present past violent
confrontations with Turkish Cypriots as acts of legitimate heroic defense against what is
perceived as an eternal Turkish threat. Both accounts thereby justify their past actions and
current positions by placing blame on other agents as responsible for the Cyprus Problem.
Nationalism presents perhaps the ultimate expression of fictive kinship through the use of
familial idioms and brotherly metaphors. AKEL rhetoric consistently uses the phrase "our
brothers" (ta adhelfia mas) to refer to Turkish Cypriots while DISI reserves this only for Greeks.
"grand" narratives, local and personal history
In the remainder of this article, I examine the ways in which such "grand" narratives are
articulated and contested in the area in which I conducted my fieldwork. I also explore the
relationships of such abstract narratives with more intimate local and personal histories. My
ethnographic locale was Kato Enories (Lower Parishes), an area in the Old Town of the divided
capital Nicosia, and comprising three neighborhoods: Takhtakalas, Khrisaliniotissa, and Ayios
Kasianos. The area's history reflects the broader modern history of Cyprus in important ways:
EOKA was active there during the late 1 950s, interethnic confrontations between Greek Cypriots
and Turkish Cypriots living in Takhtakalas started in 1958, and numerous violent confrontations
among Greek Cypriots of the Left and Right took place in the area. During the period of
interethnic violence in 1963 most Turkish Cypriots left the area and resettled in other parts of
Nicosia. During 1974 many Greek Cypriot refugees moved in, and the line that had divided the
area as a fluid-and occasionally penetrable-ethnic boundary since 1958 became a fixed and
uncrossable border.
On one occasion while I was in a coffee shop talking with a man in his sixties, a supporter
of AKEL (A), another man in his fifties who was a DISI supporter (D) overheard our discussion
and joined in to express his disagreement with what was being said:
A: So, okay, we used to live well with the Turks. Then we got independence; we did not want it.
You had the superpatriots [iperpatriotes] who were shouting for enosis; the Greeks [kalamara-
dhes] came down here [ekatevikan dhamesa], and they did the coup. Look at us now! Look at
what a miserable state they brought to us [e to intalos mas ekatantisan]! Turkey descended
[ekateviken] on us; they divided us; so many have been killed, others missing, but we also did
quite a lot when the Turks used to live around here.
D: [angrily] These words are nonsense. Let's not put the victim [thima] and the criminal [thiti] in the
same position. The Turks always used to attack us; look at what happened in Smyrni, Constanti-
nople, Thrace. We can't just say anything we want.
This incident is significant because it reflects a number of the points of disagreement between
AKEL and DISI supporters that I encountered during my fieldwork. In the first place, it shows
how people articulate their views on the Cyprus Problem. Both sides employ a discursive format
in which the two genres, that of the political commentary (establishing blame) and that of the
historical narrative (establishing what "took place") are indistinguishable. The debate on history
and identity is one and the same because a historical narrative includes both a plot (story) and
various actors or categories of actors. As Lincoln (1989:21-37) points out, narratives of conflict
are paradigmatic for establishing social boundaries between allies and enemies, an issue that
is one of nationalism's primary concerns. Thus, in presentations of historical narratives narrators
simultaneously narrate plots and put forth their perspectives on identity by choosing certain
categories of actors as the story's pertinent dramatis personae. By thus identifying themselves
with these categories Greek Cypriot narrators implicitly express their views on the issue of the
collective identity of Greek Cypriots. This identification emerges through the use of the first
person plural ("we" or "us"), which provides the moral center of the narrative. At the risk of
oversimplifying, I argue that in the articulation of a narrative-cum-commentary the action or
story emerges through the plot, identity emerges through the actors and their relationships, and
the relevant geopolitical area emerges through the setting where the action takes place. Finally,
by putting forth their views, actors challenge other perspectives. In this particular case, although
the DISI supporter was not specifically addressed, his intervention and the way in which he
intervened signaled the perception of a challenge.
I will first examine the position of the AKEL supporter. This individual starts with the idea of
"peaceful coexistence"; he then blames the Greek Cypriot "superpatriots" for their continued
demands for enosis. The term superpatriot is often used ironically to describe both those who
want enosis and DISI supporters in general; it connotes fanaticism to the point of disaster, and
it implies that members of the Right, who continually allude to Hellenism and try to appear as
the most patriotic, may in the end not be patriotic at all. After all, AKEL supporters say, it is they
(the superpatriots), along with their "Greek brothers," who, in carrying out the coup, brought
disaster to Cyprus. The implication of this is that, as far as Cyprus is concerned, the true patriots
were those followers of AKEL who had the best relations with the Turkish Cypriots and who
were, along with Turkish Cypriots, victims of the "superpatriots." The AKEL supporter's last
sentence, concerning Greek Cypriot atrocities toward Turkish Cypriots, should be understood
specifically in this light: Greek Cypriots did commit atrocities, the man says, but not all did so;
it is the superpatriots of the Right who are responsible for these.
Cyprus and Cypriots are at the center of this narrative. Both Greeks and Turks "descended"
on Cyprus, and both are depicted as outsiders. For Greeks the derogatory term kalamaradhes
is used.9 This term carries connotations of untrustworthiness (suggesting betrayal) and cunning
(see Stamatakis 1991:70-73). The victims were all Cypriots: Greek Cypriots were the main
victims of the Turkish invasion, while Turkish Cypriots were the victims of the superpatriots'
aggression-and possibly also the victims of the Turkish invasion because, as they say, "before
they used to live well with the Greek Cypriots" and presumably shared in the rapid economic
development of Cyprus. It is the Cypriots, in general, with whom the narrator seems to identify.
Although the central actor of the story ("we") clearly refers to Greek Cypriots, his narrative shows
a sense of empathy with Turkish Cypriots. Greeks and Turks are presented as clear outsiders
who brought disaster, and Cyprus is presented as the appropriate geopolitical setting for the
analysis of history.
I will now consider the DISI supporter. This man not only disagreed with the AKEL supporter,
but also claimed that the other's argument was more or less irrelevant. Instead of refuting it,
however, he changed the terms of the game and suggested a different version of the past. In his
narrative, there are two actors: the Turks and Hellenism. Turks compose the criminal part, and
the DISI supporter does not like to hear of Turkish Cypriots presented as victims because they
are part of the greater whole of "Turks." The relevant history is that of Hellenism; Turks are the
"eternal" enemy and the relevant setting is the area that Hellenism (the Byzantines) legitimately
controlled before the Turks appeared (Table 1). The problem now lies in the continuous
encroachment by the Turks on "Greek" lands, as has already occurred in "Smirni" (izmir),
"Constantinople" (Istanbul), and Cyprus, and as they plan to do in Thrace. The Greeks are the
sole victims. The group with which this man chooses to identify is the Greeks (or, more
specifically, Hellenism), and in this way his view regarding the collective identity of Greek
Cypriots implicitly emerges (Table 1).
Table 1. Historical narrative and political commentary.
Action: Plot Actors: Identity Setting: Area

AKEL History of "peaceful Insiders: Cypriots Cyprus
coexistence" Outsiders: Greeks, Turks
DISI History of Hellenism Insiders: Greeks Greece, Turkey,

Outsiders: Turks and Cyprus
Part of the appeal of such contested grand narratives emerges from the ways in which they
can potentially relate to personal biography and local history. Thus the conflicts described above
are not simply abstract stories, but instead provide strong resonances with lived experience in
Kato Enories. In the same way that states and parties create their own mythologies to justify and
glorify their pasts and to promote their future aims, so do other social actors, including
individuals. De Certeau (1984:126), pursuing a perspective compatible with the one I am
proposing in this article, suggests that higher levels of authority build on, manipulate, and
articulate ideas or views that are expressed in local or personal stories. The two coffee
shops-cum-local soccer clubs in Kato Enories, the AKEL-controlled Orfeas and the DISI-con-
trolled Olympiakos, provide an interesting focus for the examination of such local stories.
The decorative symbolism of the buildings of these clubs, treated here in terms of self-
presentation, immediately links them to broader political issues. First, the symbolic exuberance
of Olympiakos contrasts with the symbolic poverty of Orfeas. This is typical of Greek Cypriot
right-wing ethnikofrona (those adhering to the national ideals) clubs and left-wing aristera
(simply left) ones. These very terms also suggest the interest of the Right in a higher symbolic
order (the nation) in contrast to the Left's more mundane statement of simply being left-wing.
Inside Olympiakos numerous photographs of members who belonged to EOKA are displayed
on the walls and are accompanied by slogans such as "Long live the nation," "Long live 1821"
(the start of the Greek independence struggle against the Ottomans), and "Long live the 1 st of
April" (the start of the EOKA insurrection). Outside Olympiakos fly two flags, one Greek and
the other that of the club, while inside fly numerous small Greek flags. Olympiakos members
explained that the flag of the club was created during the British colonial period; black stripes
stood for Greek mourning during the occupation while green stripes stood for Greek hopes of
"national redemption." Supposedly, the flag would change into blue and white (the colors of
the Greek flag) once enosis had taken place. This kind of story implicitly alludes to a genre of
folktales that Greek folklorists eagerly collected, preserved, and circulated (see Herzfeld 1982).
Their common theme was one of unfinished national integration: for example, the last Byzantine
emperor was transformed into a statue when Constantinople fell into Turkish hands but will
come to life as soon as it becomes "ours once more"; and, when the Turks entered, fish that
were being cooked jumped into the water, to await the time when that city would return to Greek
hands, at which point they will jump back into the frying pan and be cooked on the other side.
Orfeas is symbolically silent; its walls are devoid of political symbols. This symbolic
imbalance reflects the difficulty the Left experiences in utilizing potent political symbols beyond
the notion of promoting coexistence. The Left cannot use symbols from the EOKA struggle or
those associated with Hellenism or Greek history as its supporters did not participate in the
EOKA struggle, while Hellenism belongs to the symbolic armory of the Right, whose supporters
promote that paradigm of history. Because throughout this century and up to 1974 Greek Cypriot
political rhetoric was dominated by the notion of enosis, the culture, language, and historical
narratives of Cyprus have been presented as integral parts of the broader whole of Hellenism
in order to justify the demand for enosis. No efforts were then made to create uniquely "Cypriot"
cultural or historical symbols. This may lead the Left to use a language of ironic subversion of
nationalist rhetoric in order to accuse the Right of responsibility for the 1974 tragedy.
AKEL supporters living in Kato Enories presented Olympiakos in their accounts of the area's
past as the local "home" of the extreme right in the area-a construction that parallels their
description of DISI as their institutional "roof." These supporters talked of personal fear and
persecution during the EOKA struggle, and of being threatened by jubilant Olympiakos
supporters who roamed the streets after the coup and sometimes entered AKEL members' homes
to make arrests during the days of the usurpers' brief rule. Those who were in the army during
the junta spoke oftorture, bad placements, and stigmatization for being communists in the hands
of the kalamaradhes (that is, the Greek officers). "They," the AKEL supporters accusingly said
in reference to members of Olympiakos, "attacked the Turkish Cypriots who lived in the area,
causing them to flee in 1963," and "they broughtthe Turks to Cyprus." This choice of verb and
of the active form indicate causality and blame.
The narrators of these accounts clearly express empathy for Turkish Cypriots, primarily
because they identify themselves with Turkish Cypriots as common victims of the extreme Right
(although it was not possible for me to ascertain how retroactive this sentiment was). At the
same time, these narrators portray AKEL as the party that had always been proindependence
and pro-Turkish Cypriot, thus ignoring its past flirtations with enosis; when prodded, my
informants claimed not to know or remember that dalliance. Ethnikofron (the state of being
nationally minded), a term that the Right uses as a positive self-designation, was used by these
narrators ironically-as was the term Greek brothers when they alluded to the destruction
brought about by those members of EOKA B and the Greek officers in Cyprus, who presented
themselves as always speaking in the name of "Hellenism."
Olympiakos supporters, by contrast, presented Olympiakos as being at the forefront of all
national struggles, and their club as "the front towers of Hellenism and resistance" (propiryio
ellinismou ke antistasis). First they outline the EOKA struggle during which, according to my
informants, Olympiakos members "sacrificed themselves" during the fighting against "the British
and their Turkish collaborators." Then they discuss how, during the "Turkish Mutiny" (tourk-
oantarsia), as the 1960s interethnic conflict has come to be officially called, Olympiakos
members comprised the center of regional resistance against the "mutiny" aimed at dissolving
the republic: most of the local fighting took place in the Olympiakos club building. Members
describe how they were directly attacked by the Turkish Cypriots during EOKA when Turkish
Cypriots tried to burn their club and how they were once stoned by the communists during
previous outbreaks of labor unrest. When discussing the fierceness, aggression, and animosity
of the Turkish Cypriots, several informants added, "Yes, you see that's how 'our brothers'
behaved," thereby ridiculing the leftist appeals to brotherhood with Turkish Cypriots. These
individuals present Orfeas as the local "roof" of the communists, claiming that it is a club run
in an authoritarian and conspiratorial way-much like AKEL-and they point out the lack of
participation by Orfeas members in any of the local and broader national struggles. They
attribute this nonparticipation to AKEL's status as a Moscow-directed party and thus as not
guided by the interests of the nation.
The ironic allusion to "our Turkish Cypriot brothers" is highly significant because such leftist
claims implicitly present the local interethnic fighting led by Olympiakos members as sad and
harmful fratricide, although Olympiakos supporters prefer to portray it as glorious fighting
against the "eternal enemy." Two of the key terms that Olympiakos supporters employ in
self-designations carry precisely these connotations regarding "the Turks." Often, Olympiakos
is described as akritas while Kato Enories is called Akritikes Enories. Akrites (meaning "those at
the border") were the guardians of borders during the Byzantine period, and revered by Greek
historians and folklorists as heroic guardians of the borders of Hellenism against infidel attacks
(Herzfeld 1982:118-119). In descriptions of interethnic fights, informants use the word palli-
karia (brave young men) to describe fighters from Olympiakos or the defenders of the area in
general. This word also has the historical connotation of the heroic fighters against the Turks
during the Greek uprising of 1821 (see Koliopoulos 1987:293-325). Interestingly, it is a word
used in an ironic sense both by left-wing Greek Cypriots when they dismiss right-wing heroic
rhetoric and by Turkish Cypriots when they allude to Greek Cypriots in general or to Greek
Cypriot fighters as troublesome or troublemaking Greeks.
The relationship of local history to grand narratives emerges from the ways in which
discussions of life history merge with perspectives on local and supralocal history. Initially I was
perturbed to discover that my attempts to collect life histories were not completely successful
because it was difficult to delimit the scope of the conversation by focusing attention on personal
issues. Informants invariably deflected my elicitation of personal biographies into political
commentaries on local or national history, enunciated in unison with personal experiences.
Gradually I came to realize that the problem lay in my own assumption that there existed some
kind of bounded "private space" separable from wider social and political domains. This
problem was further complicated by circumstances in which social relations in Cyprus are
characterized by an intense politicization of private life that affects even seemingly innocent
choices such as those between various brands of beer or brandy (e.g., see Loizos
1975:126-127). I thus find it instructiveto examine how, despite my initially misguided attempts
to collect personal histories, my informants proceeded to give accounts that linked personal
biography with local and national histories. I gradually realized that personal narratives
consistently evolved into wider commentaries as the narrators addressed certain key historical
junctures. At such junctures individuals were inevitably incorporated into events of wider
significance even if they had not been active participants. The ways in which people became
involved, however, were not uniform, because these trajectories depended on the actors'
respective political affiliations.
I will illustrate these comments with the example of Kostas (a pseudonym), a man in his fifties
who had been a relatively affluent farmer until 1974, when he became a refugee; he has since
worked as a paid laborer in the building sector. We met in the privacy of his home to talk about
"his life." Kostas began his narrative by recalling an adolescence that was pleasant until the
mid-i 950s when the EOKA struggle erupted. At that point Kostas focused his narrative on the
ramifications of the EOKA struggle: how communists, such as he and his father, felt increasingly
threatened by EOKA fighters, particularly because, in other villages, some communists who
were deemed to be traitors had been executed or beaten up by EOKA. His father had employed
Turkish Cypriots from a neighboring village but stopped doing so during the EOKA period out
of a fear that he would be accused of cooperating with the enemy; this situation became more
dire because TMT, the Turkish resistance groups, soon became active as well, and interethnic
fighting broke out in nearby Nicosia. Afterthis story, Kostas directed his narrative into a lengthy,
general discussion of the current political situation, the problems that the EOKA struggle had
created for communists, what had happened in other places, and how interethnic relations in
general had begun to deteriorate. Once he had finished this discussion we talked about life after
the 1960 declaration of independence. This time his narrative once again assumed a more
personal tone as he described how he got married, started raising a family, and, when his
financial situation improved, with his wife's help set up a small shop that was doing well. (The
Greek Cypriot economy as a whole was rapidly expanding during the 1960s.) He noted briefly
that interethnic conflict had resumed after 1963, and noted that "right-wingers under the
leadership of Grivas" were involved in these events. In short comments he focused primarily
on the fact that he could no longer travel freely through some neighboring Turkish Cypriot areas
that had become bounded enclaves. But when he started discussing the 1970s and the
emergence of EOKA B, he again abandoned the personal tone and entered into a long diatribe
on the ways in which EOKA B supporters who were aided by the Greek junta and by Greek
officers in the Greek Cypriot army were involved in "terrorist activities," the ways in which "the
Greeks were trying to undermine our independence," and the fact that he and, I suspect, others
as well were worried that all this was bound to come to a "bad end." "And we were right," he
continued, as he described the events of 1974:
The day of the coup the fascists rang the church bell; they wanted to say that Cyprus had been liberated
from Makarios and that enosis was taking place. They were armed and roaming the village in fatigues on
Land Rovers.... They arrested a number of active communists whom they took away; we thought we
would never see them again. In the end they were only beaten up and returned. We stayed at home,
worried that at any moment they'd come in and get me.... They were also talking about attacking a
neighboring Turkish village.
Kostas proceeded to talk at length about the war with Turkey and how horrible it had been for
him to run for his life, carrying the children, with "nothing but the clothes we were wearing."
He exclaimed repeatedly, "And you see those who are responsible for these, like so-and-so who
came and rounded up the communists in the village, are now walking around free, as if nothing
happened. Why, they even wave the Greek flags and play at being the greatest patriots." From
that point on he continuously interrupted his narrative of resettlement and the problems his
family faced as they struggled to make a new living with comments on those who had created
this problem in the first place, who was to blame, and how all these events had come about.
It is at these points-when the informant's "personal" narrative was not sustained and where
he confronted, discussed, and evaluated broader issues-that one may understand how
individuals are "drawn into" history at certain historical junctures. When this man and other
communists discussed their fear of EOKA, or their fear of the coup participants, they were no
longer talking as specific individuals; instead, they were participating in a discourse as AKEL
supporters whose position in the Greek Cypriot political spectrum led to a uniform set of
experiences and fears. Not surprisingly, these informants abandoned the personal or individu-
alistic narrative style when their discussions reached these common historical periods. At these
moments the informants expressed their experiences not simply as those of individuals but as
those of AKEL members. They came to share the same "enemies"-in particular, the "national-
ists" aided by "the Greeks" (the junta and the army contingent in Cyprus) who also threatened
the Turkish Cypriots, with whom the narrators sometimes expressed empathy.
Those informants who were right-wing members of Olympiakos similarly abandoned the
"personal" tone in their narratives when they described attacks by left-wingers and Turkish
Cypriots and their own struggles against the British during 1955-60 and the Turkish Cypriots
from 1963 to 1967. Their enemies were the British, the left-wingers, and the Turkish Cypriots
against whom they had fought with the Greek army as occasional allies. It is important to note
here that not all had participated in these struggles; in fact the actual number of participants
was relatively small. Nevertheless, even among those who did not participate in combat, there
were many who claimed to have helped by transporting guns, hiding fighters, and in other ways.
Significantly, many of those who had not directly participated frequently elected to express
solidarity with the fighters or the generic cause. This was habitually expressed as "when our
people were fighting."
conclusion
I have discussed how various supporters of DISI and AKEL comment on genera
history and identity, and how they link their own accounts of personal and local h
the broader historical narratives proposed by their parties. I am suggesting here that
narratives gain appeal because they are built on elements of personal and local h
emerge from their supporters' accounts of their experiences and memories. At the
accounts of local and personal history acquire form and structure from the mo
historical paradigms proposed by the political parties with which their supporter
daily contact-primarily through the newspapers controlled by such parties. This is
process. I therefore find it difficult to support Spencer's view that nationalism sim
from dislocation and is related to the loss of communal experience. Instead, I sugge
the ways in which people talk about the nation in relation to their own pasts which
how particular narratives acquire force and credibility. Similarly, an appeal to ge
or ontologies, such as Kapferer's argument, cannot adequately reveal the conteste
nationalism and the particular forms that such contestation may assume within a si
The construction and reconstruction of such narratives by states, political parties, an
agents may thus be seen as retroactive attempts, made in the context of contemporary
concerns, to present past actions in the best possible light and to attribute blame to oth
Greek Cypriot narratives of history and collective identity
Although I have been primarily concerned with outlining two general models, I do not intend
to suggest that agents are completely bound by these conditions. Instead, I suggest that it is more
productive to regard these paradigms as enabling rather than as constraining, since there are
always possibilities for selectively or strategically using them according to the context and the
actors' aims. Indeed, concepts like action, strategy, or tactics only have meaning in relation to
the concept of structure; I am merely claiming that these two paradigms provide the relevant
structures within which a multitude of tactics (see de Certeau 1984:29-42) may operate.
For example, AKEL, as well as all the other parties, publicly dismissed a Greek Cypriot
intellectual who stated on a very popular and controversial television program that he feels "not
Greek but Cypriot." After the row had subsided, however, AKEL gave the intellectual a weekly
column in its newspaper Kharavyi (Dawn). A further example of subversive tactics can be
illustrated through the rhetorical practices of AKEL supporters. Such supporters of the Left
occasionally utilized the classic beginning of nationalist history ("Cyprus has been under many
rulers") as the start of their historical account. Instead of continuing with the nationalist rhetoric
("but its [Greek] soul has never changed"), however, my leftist informants frequently subvert
this narrative by adding sexual connotations of impurity, claiming that "since so many have
passed over us, we may in fact be bastards." In this way they reject the nationalist discourse of
purity while simultaneously using its blood metaphor to imply that Cypriots might be an
amalgam of Greeks, Turks, and perhaps others.10 They also create an implicit common racial
community with Turkish Cypriots at the same time as they differentiate Cypriots from Greeks,
who, after all, profess themselves to be pure Greeks. In other contexts, individuals use silence
as an appropriate strategy. Shop owners who complain about their political opponents some-
times stop or change the topic of the discussion if customers with whom they disagree politically
enter the store. Many people display small Greek or Cypriot flag stickers on their cars to mark
their political views (see also Stamatakis 1991:80). A young man told me, however, that he
removed his Greek flag sticker because he occasionally encountered difficulties when he visited
left-wing clients. In effect, he chose to keep silent on his political views in the marketplace.
I suggest that it is also important to keep in mind Handler's argument (1988) that totalizing
or homogenizing any social formation is, in itself, one of the primary assumptions of nationalism.
Actors' adherence to political parties occurs for many reasons, and the membership of such
groups is far from homogeneous. Part of the following of DISI, for example, comprises
upper-class businessmen, who explicitly explain that they support DISI on the grounds of its
pro-Western, free-market policies, and because it presents the strongest challenge to AKEL's
communist threat. They consider the rhetoric of Hellenism or heroism as extremist and
potentially destabilizing bravado, and they ridicule Greece as a "third world state" with whom
business dealings are "a continuous source of problems" and as a place where they would not
want their children to attend university.
If anything unites Greek Cypriots in a community, it is their participation in a debate about
what constitutes the nation, not some shared conception of "the nation." This is the core of the
debate on the Cyprus Problem, which takes place through the construction of narratives that
simultaneously challenge and define relations of inclusion and exclusion, territoriality, and the
plots of pertinent historical adventures. Different societies face different pressing problems,
ranging from unemployment to ethnic secessionism. Such present concerns give rise to a sense
of nostalgia for some golden age that is believed to have existed before these problems arose
(e.g., the time of peaceful coexistence, the glorious Byzantine Empire, or the prosperity before
the immigrants arrived).'" Thus the notion of a problem appears as the fourth vital ingredient of
nationalism. In this light, nationalism can be regarded as a process in which actors debate what
the problems are, how they arise, and who should receive blame for them-all accompanied
by the implicit disclaimer: "It is not our fault."
notes
Acknowledgments. This article is based on 15 months of fieldwork among Greek Cypriots and five
with Turkish Cypriots in Turkey, London, and Cyprus during 1990-92. For their financial he
fieldwork, I would like to thank Smuts Memorial Fund, Leventis Foundation, Emslie Hornim
Richards Fund, and Wyse Fund. Writing was facilitated by a Senior Rouse Ball Studentship at Trinity
Cambridge, and later by a Fellowship at Churchill College funded by the Bodossakis Foundatio
versions of this article were presented in the writing-up seminar at the Department of Social Ant
and at the Modern Greek Lecture Series, Cambridge University; I would like to thank the partic
these seminars for their helpful comments. For their more specific comments, I would like to thank
Cassia, Peter Loizos, Chris Hann, and Michael Herzfeld. I am also grateful to the anonymous AE r
for their comments and advice. None of these persons nor any of the funding institutions holds resp
for the views expressed here.
1. This is the standard map (Republic of Cyprus Public Information Office 1991) used to illustr
Cyprus Problem.
2. See, for example, Ismail's argument that "Cyprus is a natural extension of Anatolia" (Ismail
3. See Spencer 1990b for Kapferer's reply and see Kapferer 1989:195-196 for a further elabo
the concept of "ontology."
4. In addition to the small numbers of Greek and Turkish soldiers that were permitted by
constitution, many more came secretly in support of their respective ethnic groups (Patrick 197
The higher positions in both the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot armies were staffed by Greek an
officers.
5. My analysis at this point fully converges with that of Stamatakis (1991:76-79) on the basis of
of similar observations.
6. These are the Enieon Komma (Unified Party), Proodheftiki Parataksis (Progressive Front), and Dhimo-
kratiko Ethniko Komma (Democratic National Party). See Coufoudakis 1983 and Loizos 1974:126 for more
information on the positions of these organizations during the 1970 elections.
7. See, for example, DISI's 1991 Election Manifesto (DISI 1 991).
8. The data I collected from my fieldwork with Turkish Cypriots suggest that there exists a strong sense
of solidarity between the Turkish Cypriot Left and AKEL. Left-wing (party and individual) rhetoric also
emphasizes adherence to a similar Cypriot paradigm of history and identity that blames the nationalists of
both sides and degrades the Turks of Turkey. The Turkish Cypriot Right identifies more strongly with Turkish
history and identity. The strongest general statement on history and identity in Cyprus from an AKEL
perspective is that provided by Grekos (1980-82). See also Irodotou 1994 for an account of the reasons for
which AKEL supporters dislike the discourse of "Hellenic Christian" ideals.
9. Kalamaradhes is a term used for Greeks by Greek Cypriots only in oral discourse. For this reason it is
difficult to trace changes in its meaning. While its original meaning was akin to "scribbler" and had positive
connotations, Greek Cypriots later started to employ it only in a negative sense. This shift could be linked
to the junta's disastrous interference in Cyprus.
10. For a general appraisal of the blood metaphor in nationalist discourse see Herzfeld 1 993:22-25,
28-32, et passim. See also Just 1989 for a discussion of the blood idiom in Greek nationalist rhetoric.
11. For a much wider discussion of nostalgia and its relationship to nationalism, see Herzfeld
1997:109-138.
references cited
Adams, Thomas
1971 AKEL: The Communist Party of Cyprus. Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press.
AKEL
1991 I Dhiki Mas Protasi (Our proposal). AKEL Election Manifesto.
Anderson, Benedict
1991 Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso.
Attalides, Michael
1979 Cyprus: Nationalism and International Politics. New York: St. Martin's Press.
Bourdieu, Pierre
1989[1977] Outline of a Theory of Practice. Richard Nice, trans. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Coufoudakis, Van
1983 Cyprus. In Political Parties of Europe. Vincent E. McHale, ed. Pp. 104-133. Westport, CT:
Greenwood Press.
de Certeau, Michel
1984 The Practice of Everyday Life. Steven F. Rendall, trans. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Dimaras, Konstantinos
1985 Ellinikos Romantismos (Greek romanticism.) Athens: Ermis.
Dimen, Muriel, and Ernestine Friedl, eds.
1976 Regional Variation in Modern Greece and Cyprus: Towards a Perspective on the Ethnology of
Greece. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 268. New York: New York Academy of
Sciences.
DISI
1991 I Protasi Mas Ya to Mellon (Our proposal for the future). DISI Election Manifesto.
Gellner, Ernest
1983 Nations and Nationalism. Oxford: Blackwell.
Giddens, Anthony
1985 The Nation-State and Violence: Volume 2 of a Contemporary Critique of Historical Materialism
Cambridge, UK: Polity Press.
Grekos, Kostas
1980-82 Kipriaki Istoria (Cypriot History). Volumes a-b. Nicosia, Cyprus: Printco.
Handler, Richard
1988 Nationalism and the Politics of Culture in Quebec. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
Herzfeld, Michael
1982 Ours Once More: Folklore, Ideology, and the Making of Modern Greece. Austin: University o
Texas Press.
1993 The Social Production of Indifference: Exploring the Symbolic Roots of Western Bureaucracy.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
1997 Cultural Intimacy: Social Poetics in the Nation-State. London and New York: Routledge.
Hobsbawm, Eric
1990 Nations and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth and Reality. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
1992 Ethnicity and Nationalism in Europe Today. Anthropology Today 8(1):3-8.
Irodotou, Stelios
1994 Ta "ellinohristianika idheodhi" ke i "ellinokentriki pedhia" ("Hellenic-Christian ideals" and
"Hellenocentric education"). Kharavyi, August 11:7.
Ismail, Sabahattin
1989 20 July Peace Operation: Reasons Development and Consequences. Istanbul: Kastasa Publications.
Just, Roger
1989 Triumph of the Ethnos. In History and Ethnicity. Elizabeth Tonkin, Malcom Chapman, and Maryn
McDonald, eds. Pp. 71-88. Association of Social Anthropologists Monographs, 27. London: Rout-
ledge.
Kapferer, Bruce
1988 Legends of People, Myths of State: Violence, Intolerance, and Political Culture in Sri Lanka and
Australia. Washington, DC and London: Smithsonian Institution Press.
1989 Nationalist Ideology and a Comparative Anthropology. Ethnos 54(3-4):161-199.
Kitromilides, Paschalis
1981 To Idheoloyiko Plesio tis Politikis Zois stin Kipro: Kritiki Theorisi (The ideological context of
political life in Cyprus: critical evaluation). In Kipros: Istoria, Provlimata ke Aghones tou Laou tis
(Cyprus: history, problems, and struggles of its people). Giorgos Tenekidis and Nikos Kranidiotis, eds.
Pp. 449-471. Athens: Estia.
Koliopoulos, John
1987 Brigands with a Cause: Brigandage and Irredentism in Modern Greece, 1821-1912. Oxford:
Clarendon.
Lincoln, Bruce
1989 Discourse and the Construction of Society: Comparative Studies of Myth, Ritual, and Classification.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Loizos, Peter
1974 The Progress of Greek Nationalism in Cyprus: 1878-1970. In Choice and Change: Essays in
Honour of Lucy Mair. John Davis, ed. Pp. 114-133. London: Athlone.
1975 The Greek Gift: Politics in a Cypriot Village. Oxford: Blackwell.
1976 Notes on Future Anthropological Research in Cyprus. In Regional Variation in Modern Greece
and Cyprus: Towards a Perspective on the Ethnography of Greece. Muriel Dimen and Ernestine Friedl,
eds. Pp. 355-362. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 268. New York: New York Academy
of Sciences.
1981 The Heart Grown Bitter: A Chronicle of Cypriot War Refugees. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Markides, Kyriakos
1974 Social Change and the Rise and Decline of Social Movements. American Ethnologist 1:309-330.
North Cyprus Almanac
1987 London: K. Rustem and Brother.
Papaioannou, loannis
1984 Politics in Cyprus between 1961 and 1981. Nicosia, Cyprus: Theopress.
Patrick, Richard
1976 Political Geography and the Cyprus Conflict, 1963-1971. Department of Geography Publications
Series, 4. Waterloo, Ontario: Faculty of Environmental Studies, University of Waterloo.
Peristiany, J. G.
1976 Anthropological, Sociological, and Geographical Fieldwork in Cyprus. In Regional Variation in
Modern Greece and Cyprus: Towards a Perspective on the Ethnography of Greece. Muriel Dimen and
Ernestine Friedl, eds. Pp. 344-354. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 268. New York:
New York Academy of Sciences.
Pollis, Adamantia
1979 Colonialism and Neo-Colonialism: Determinants of Ethnic Conflict in Cyprus. In Small States in
the Modern World: The Conditions of Survival. Peter Worsley and Paschalis Kitromilides, eds. Pp.
45-80. Nicosia, Cyprus: The New Cyprus Association.
Republic of Cyprus Public Information Office
1991 Map of Cyprus Indicating the Positions of the Turkish Occupying Forces. Nicosia, Cyprus:
Government Printing House.
Rudolf, John
1980 National Security. In Cyprus: A Country Study. Frederica Bunge, ed. Pp. 205-239. Washington,
DC: Foreign Area Studies, American University.
Smith, Anthony
1991 National Identity. London: Penguin.
Stamatakis, Nikos
1991 History and Nationalism: The Cultural Reconstruction of Modern Greek Cypriot Identity. The
Cyprus Review 3(1):59-86.
Spencer, Jonathan
1990a A Sinhala Village in a Time of Trouble: Politics and Change in Rural Sri Lanka. Delhi: Oxford
University Press.
1990b Writing Within: Anthropology, Nationalism, and Culture in Sri Lanka. Current Anthropology
31(3):283-300.
submitted July 5, 1994

revised version submitted February 28, 1995
revised version submitted July 16, 1996
accepted December 12, 1996

PAPADAKIS-cyprus American Ethnologist PDF

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

PAPADAKIS-cyprus American Ethnologist PDF

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Greek Cypriot Narratives of History and Collective Identity: Nationalism as a Contested

American Anthropological Association, Wiley are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize,

YIANNIS PAPADAKIS-University of Cyprus

-C. Spyridakis, minister of education in Cyprus, January 14, 1968

Cyprus belongs to its people.

In this article I consider the appeal of "grand" historical narratives of nationalism

American Ethnologist 25(2):149-165. Copyright ? 1998, American Anthropological Association.

Greek Cypriot narratives of history and collective identity 149

150 american ethnologist

the Cyprus problem

Cyprus, an eastern Mediterranean island, emerged as an independent state in 1960 after a

Greek Cypriot narratives of history and collective identity 151

152 american ethnologist

Figure 1. The dilemma of Greek Cypriot ident

rapprochement with the Turkish Cypriots leads to

In this section I present the views of the two largest G

Figure 2. Parameters of Cyp

Greek Cypriot narrativ

154 american ethnologist

Greek Cypriot narratives of history and collective identity 155

"grand" narratives, local and personal history

156 american ethnologist

Table 1. Historical narrative and political commentary.

Action: Plot Actors: Identity Setting: Area

DISI History of Hellenism Insiders: Greeks Greece, Turkey,

Greek Cypriot narratives of history and collective identity 157

158 american ethnologist

Greek Cypriot narratives of history and collective identity 159

160 american ethnologist

Greek Cypriot narratives of history and collective identity

162 american ethnologist

Greek Cypriot narratives of history and collective identity 163

164 american ethnologist

submitted July 5, 1994

Greek Cypriot narratives of history and collective identity 165

You might also like