Reaffirming the reasons of history at school in a troubled and complex world

Abstract

The major crises of the contemporary world make it all the more important for the teaching of history to all students, but at the same time require a renewal of its aims and rationale. After outlining the societal challenges we face at the start of the 21st century, and those that lie ahead for the generations to come, this contribution considers and supports five functions of school history that could serve to address them: the discovery of the strangeness and difference of the past; the explanation of what is observed on the basis of plural documentation; the protection of traces and memories, particularly the most fragile and hidden; the inclusion of all human groups in the narratives and reflections, by crossing their points of view; and the idea of defatalizing history by examining the experiences and room for action of men and women of the past in their present, its uncertainties and possibilities.