Only the West knows history. Marc Bloch wrote: «The Greeks and Latins, our first teachers, were people who were writers of history. Christianity is a religion of historians. […] it is in duration, therefore in history, that the great drama of Sin and Redemption takes place.”Thus begins the paragraph dedicated to the History of the New National Indications for the first cycle, 154 pages which in my role as Headmaster I had to read carefully
Cold shiver down my spine… well… I try to reread several times and nothing, my body suggests an immediate and visceral rejection.Therefore there would be a geographically determined part of humanity (the West) which would be the sole custodian of the knowledge of History and not of just any History, mind you, but of that which emerges in particular from the spread of Christianity and the unfolding of the drama of Sin and Redemption. But what really?
I continue in the hope of finding some more welcoming cove. Other cultures, other civilizations have known something that vaguely resembles history, such as annalistic compilations of dynasties or eminent facts that have occurred over time; in the same way, for a certain period of their centuries-old history, other civilizations, other cultures, also witnessed the beginning of writing that possessed the characteristics of historical writing. But that beginning soon remained that way, folding in on itself and not giving rise to any development; therefore not marking their own culture in any way as the dimension of History has marked ours. Nothing in fact, the discomfort increases…
Obviously I do not have in-depth and specific knowledge and skills of all world history but I cannot share the idea that there is a History of a part of the world identified as hierarchically superior and the only custodian of cultural awareness because this presupposes the existence of a superior part of human beings as protagonists of that same History. Among other things, there is not only history linked to writing, nor even only Christian history, even after the spread of Christianity. My literary studies then come back to mind, dolphins that help me to float… I think of the enormous contaminations of the oriental world with Greek and Roman history and culture, I think of Apuleius and the fable of Cupid and Psyche, I think of the penetration of some oriental divinities in Italy such as Bacchus, Cybele or Isis, I think of all the traders, soldiers, slaves, men of letters and philosophers who interacted over the centuries in the world and with the Greco-Roman world, I think of the great historian of the 5th century BC, Herodotus (cited among other things in the Indications) who recognized the debt of Greek science towards oriental science and to the Egyptians the merit of having invented geometry…
Now I already seem to swim better, my breathing is regular, I am a human being of the world and the history that belongs to me is that of the world. Of course, in the 154 pages of the text there are also many paragraphs and many interesting and shareable reflections such as those relating to inclusion, the conscious use of artificial intelligence or those relating to the teaching of geography which at least talk about the “world” and “globalisation”.
The National Indications, however, are not just any document but the reference text for identifying the route that each educational institution chooses to follow and that route will become the tool with which we will train young people. No, it is not possible to propose such a small, exclusive and exclusionary vision. From such an important document as a citizen and professional I demand a more human thought, a higher flight
Sara Lazzaro
Leave a Reply