Marta Araújo

History textbooks, racism and the critique of Eurocentrism: beyond rectification or compensation

Abstract This article is based on the theoretical framework developed within a research project on the construction of Eurocentrism and, more specifically, on the analysis of Portuguese history textbooks. We propose that the textbooks’ master narrative constitutes a power-evasive discourse on history, which naturalizes core processes such as colonialism, slavery and racism. Showing the limits of an approach that merely proposes the compensation or rectification of (mis)representations, we argue for the need to unbind the debate on Eurocentrism from a perspective that fails to make problematic the ‘very idea of Europe’. Accordingly, our analysis of Portuguese history textbooks focuses on three core narrative devices: (1) the chronopolitics of representation; (2) the paradigm of the (democratic) national state; and (3) the definitive bond between concepts and historical processes.

A presença ausente do racial: discursos políticos e pedagógicos sobre História, "Portugal" e (pós-)colonialismo

Este artigo analisa como, nos discursos politicos e no contexto educativo portugues, o racial se insere num jogo de in/visibilidades, sendo considerado como resultante da presenca do “outro” da colonia e, logo, naturalmente irrelevante para a formacao do espaco nacional-metropolitano e, de modo geral, para a formacao da nocao de “Europeidade”. A partir desta analise, ilustramos a despolitizacao do racismo via a naturalizacao do colonialismo e a reificacao do “imaginario imigrante”; neste sentido, o racismo e interpretado como algo que sucede aos outros – etnorracialmente marcados – mas que nao diz respeito ao que “nos” somos, um “nos” que, alias, nunca e questionado. O texto esta dividido em tres partes: (i) examinamos a consolidacao da presente ausencia do racial considerando como se tem constituido um ciclo de silencios e consensos sobre o racial na propria acao de combate ao racismo – marcada pelo antirracialismo – de organizacoes globais como a UNESCO. Examinaremos ainda como a dissolucao do racial esta a ser produzida atraves da associacao entre racismo e imigracao no contexto europeu contemporâneo, tanto na politica como na academia; (ii) analisar-se-a o trabalho empirico e os livros didaticos de historia contemporâneos que realizamos em Portugal que mostram como, nos debates sobre a historia e, mais concretamente, sobre o ensino do colonialismo e da escravatura, se tem esvaziado a sua relevância politica e evadido o racial para compreender a chamada escravatura Atlântica dos seculos XV ao XIX; (iii) finalmente, concluimos com uma analise dos contornos daquilo a que denominamos o “consenso (pos-)colonial” em Portugal, inserido num contexto mais amplo de esvaziamento da plausibilidade de um vocabulario que de conta do racial/racismo nas sociedades contemporâneas.

Raça, História e Educação no Brasil e em Portugal: desafios e perspectivas

This article proposes a dialogue between the political and academic debates on race, identity, and history in the Brazilian and Portuguese contexts. In order to do so, it examines the myth of racial democracy (as it was known in Brazil) and the idea of a national vocation for interculturality in Portugal to explore how they shape the contemporary debate on racism and Eurocentrism, as well its evasion, focusing on education - which is understood as an arena for important political struggles. By addressing crucial moments in these debates, this article seeks to contribute to wider discussions on race and power in the teaching of history, and to challenge the depoliticization of contemporary narratives that continue to take refuge in the tropes of the historical specificities of each of the national contexts.

Eurocentrism, Political Struggles and the Entrenched Will-to-Ignorance: An Introduction

This edited collection is an interdisciplinary production, bringing the work of international scholars and political activists within a wide range of approaches and disciplines, including History, Anthropology, Political Sociology, Philosophy, International Relations, Political Economy and the Sociology of Education. It addresses key contemporary issues in the critique of Eurocentrism and racism, in relation to debates on the production, sedimentation and circulation of (scientific) knowledge, historical narratives and memories in Europe and the Americas. It takes as its crucial starting point the concept of Eurocentrism as grounded in the project of Modernity and, in particular, its specific configuration of colonialism, history and Being which has led to the emergence of race as a key organizing principle in the modern world order from the geopolitical perspective of the creation of Europe/Europeanness, the expression of its hegemony and its contestation.