ABSTRACT
Introduction In recent years, there has been a series of studies dealing with how individuals from several nations tend to represent the past, analysing some of the relationships between the 'official' and 'unofficial histories' and their uses (e.g., Tulviste and Wertsch, 1994; Wertsch, 1994; Wertsch and O'Connor, 1994; Wertsch and Rozin, this volume). These investigations have focused on the narrative accounts generated by subjects in which they describe and explain important national historical events. In some cases, these studies have shown that the narrative accounts produced tend to be grounded in the official historical accounts taught at school, whereas in other cases there seems to be a resistance to or even a rejection of 'official histories'. Other studies have examined the history curricula transmitted through formal education in different countries, basically from the analysis of history textbooks (e.g., Ahonen, 1992; Ferro, 1981; Riekenberg, 1991; Vazquez, 1970). In a general way, they have shown to what extent the teaching of history is sometimes focused on some important national historical episodes in order to shape some kind of national identity in students. Thus, analysing the way students of different ages and educational levels narrate an important national historical event, included in the primary and secondary Spanish history curricula, will be one of our main objectives here.
