Abstract
Although the Good Friday Agreement is often revered as a document which concluded the armed conflict in Northern Ireland, it also strengthened a binary which had been previously long established in the province. Recently, critics have drawn attention to a growing disparity between this binary and the diversifying society in the province which no longer corresponds to that 'simple' double division; specifically, they point to the growing gap between the generation that directly experienced the Troubles and a younger one that didn't. This dispute can be observed not only in the society itself but also in recent Northern Irish novels which often concentrate on how younger characters face previously established truths and knowledge and how these may clash with and frustrate their own experiences. While the immediate community these characters grow up in first helps in identifying what is important and forms a part of what then constitutes the characters' primary knowledge and memory of their world, the presentation will look at how it also hinders further development and strengthens the previously established, and possibly no longer applicable, certainties. The narratives and the memories of an older generation may cripple a development of a younger one, that attempts to create its own.
The presentation will look at a recent novel by Anna Burns' - Milkman (2018), specifically at its central characters and discuss the influences that form their background and awareness, new knowledge that they gain during the narratives, and the clash that these two realities present for them. To discuss these topics, the presentation will make use of concepts from cognitive psychology which can aid in describing the way individuals learn, gain explicit and implicit knowledge, and importantly form memories, and how these can interact under the influence of the outside world.