The Stories We Tell Ourselves: Collective Memory and the Ontario Grade 10 History Curriculum

Abstract

Collective memory, though fluid and evolving, plays a key role in strengthening a community’s bonds and identity through a common past and values and shared commemorations. The tools and methods of reinforcing and transmitting a community’s collective memory are varied and some are more obvious than others. One under-examined avenue of transmission and commemoration is the formal education system, and official curriculums in particular, despite their explicit role of teaching in a group setting. To better grasp this relationship, the portrayals of four military conflicts, WWII, the Korean War, and the October and Oka Crises, and the course’s skills and goals were compared within three editions of the Ontario Grade 10 History curriculum and with public memory at the time each was issued. The connections revealed between curricular content and the wider public memory as well as changes to the community’s overall collective memory support the role of the history curriculum as a means of transmission and commemoration and as a record of the community’s collective memory at a specific point in time.