La construction sociale de l’altérité en Grèce

Abstract

The Modern Greek state was created on the basis of a collective, mythical identity. This identity was predicated upon an allegedly homogeneous population scattered well beyond the borders of the country, with all its irredentist aspirations, and upon an imagined historical continuity that was uninterrupted since Antiquity. The massive arrival of Greek refugees in 1922 put this national identity severely to the test. Whereas the state immediately granted them civil rights, they were not welcomed by most of Greek society, which promptly marginalised them. A new rupture followed in the form of the Civil War (1949). In the course of this conflict, and more especially afterwards, the war was denied, or reduced to the lone figure of the communist—at once manipulator and manipulated—which made it possible to give comforting answers to the country's painful political, social and demographic questions. Preserving this image of the communist threat therefore necessitated silence—a silence only recently broken.

Keywords

• Modern greek identity
• refugees
• Greece
• Greek civil war (1946-1949)
• Nation-state