Two history manuals for teachers: histories of their production

Abstract

When he took up the direction of the National Institute for Pedagogical Studies (Instituto Nacional de Estudos Pedagógicos - INEP) in 1952, Anísio Teixeira started the Schoolbook and Teaching Manual Campaign (Campanha do Livro Didático e Manuais de Ensino - CALDEME) with the objective of producing schoolbooks and teaching manuals, among other didactic material. The Brazilian History and World History manuals for teachers were ordered in 1953 to Americo Jacobina Lacombe and Carlos Delgado de Carvalho, respectively. This article follows the production of those manuals presenting, as much as possible, the characters involved in it. The conflicts and debates are expressed at a particular moment of our educational history, and relate to the process of change of the historiographical production, allowing the identification of the relations between the different spheres of the didactic production. The decision to select university teachers for the composition of those works establishes the watershed between academic productions and those of a pedagogical character. The variations between different university projects to deal with the problem of teacher education are here seen under this perspective. It is hoped that the present analysis will elucidate aspects of a public educational policy at the federal level little investigated until now. Apart from that, by following the discussions that took place during the composition of those manuals, the text seeks to examine the conceptions of History, and of its teaching, that challenged each other at that time, as well as the approximations and separations between academic and school productions.