Narrative of the Middle Ages in high school history textbooks: Comparison of the textbooks of the United States, United Kingdom and Türkiye

The purpose of this research is to provide a comparative analysis of history textbooks taught in the United States, United Kingdom, and Türkiye, focusing on the topics related to the Middle Ages. A study has been conducted on the temporal content, spatial content, earnings, language and discourse, perception of the East and the West, sources used, and visuals related to the Middle Ages in the textbooks of the United States, United Kingdom, and Türkiye. By investigating the textbooks of these three countries, which have different education systems, efforts have been made to identify similarities, differences, and attitudes towards events within the framework of the defined themes. The Middle Ages topics occupy a significant place in history textbooks. The process that began with the Migration Period, the collapse of empires in the West, and the rise of powerful centers of world domination in the East, the spread of two major Abrahamic religions (Christianity and Islam) across the world, the style of social life, the formation of European identity, and the emergence of polarization and competition between the East and the West, are all defining characteristics of the Middle Ages. The process of conveying the events that have occurred during this period to the students in terms of cause and effect allows them to make predictions about the present and the future. In this context, the comprehensive approach to the topic of the Middle Ages in history textbooks of the United States, United Kingdom, and Türkiye has been investigated. In this study, the textbooks "World History Patterns of Interaction", "The Oxford Illustrated History of Medieval Europe", "Atlas of Medieval Europe", "Tarih 9" and "Tarih 10" were used as sources, and the sources were limited to the sections covering the topics of the Middle Ages. According to the results of the research, when looking at the three countries' portrayal of topics related to the Middle Ages period, differences can be observed in the content of history lessons and the desired imagery. The United States, consisting of states, the United Kingdom, which has united multiple nations under one flag, and Türkiye, as a single-nation country, exhibit these differences. In the United States and the United Kingdom, it is seen that high school history lessons, in line with the concept of modern history, adhere to the principle of neutrality in the topics conveyed. On the other hand, in Türkiye, the focus is on teaching aimed at constructing national identity. In the United States and Türkiye, history lessons are compulsory subjects in high school, while in the United Kingdom, they are elective courses. It is observed that the main material for conveying history lessons to students, which is textbooks, also differs from each other in this context.