Resumen

BOTO, Carlota. The school rationality as a civilizing process: the soul-capturing moral. Rev. Port. de Educação [online]. 2010, vol.23, n.2, pp.35-72. ISSN 0871-9187.

The purpose of this article is to focus on the subject of civilization and practices of the teaching of morals and civility at school. By using the work of Norbert Elias as the main theoretical reference, Portuguese didactic books used in schools from the middle of the XIX century to the first years of the XX century were studied. This work, from the methodological point of view, expresses a research in the field of the History of Education, where the school texts are used as sources.  By means of the books, the school purpose, which is to teach a set of behaviors deemed to be universally valid, is verified. In their turn, the text-books present different concepts of morality and several ways of conceiving the teaching of morals. The existence of clear strategies to couple the teaching of behavior ways to the teaching of reading, writing and reporting is noticed. The knowledge of junior high school clearly constitutes a way of civilizing. The concept of civilization implicitly brings the supposition of superiority of a culture over the others. The school knowledge unites with the teaching of certain abilities, of a given repertoire, that coincides with the course of values and knowledge to be sought, so that ideas of homeland, family, child, discipline, etc. are also formed. The school speaks of the world to the children; of a world to which some subtle teachings are necessary: the learning of silence, of modesty, of acceptance of the existent as being necessary, of the obedience as a value in the daily life.

Palabras clave : History of Education; Civilization; School; Text-books.

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