No room for Clio: historical and cultural awareness of younger people in liquid times

Abstract

Objectives | The aim is to understand, through an action research project carried out in the 2022-2023 academic year, in two Higher Schools (Education – ESE and Technology and Management – ESTG) of the Polytechnic Institute of Viana do Castelo, the degree of sensitivity and commitment of a group of higher education students regarding the importance of History, Heritage and Cultural Identity in their lives. To this purpose, a questionnaire survey was carried out among a group of students belonging to the Degree in Tourism (ESTG) and Masters in Pre-School Education and Teaching of the 1st Cycle of Basic Education and also in Teaching of the 1st Cycle and Mathematics and Natural Sciences and Portuguese and History and Geography of Portugal in the 2nd Cycle of Basic Education (ESE). At the same time, within the Demola project (Catalá-Perez et al, 2020), a co-creation project was developed with a group of six students from the Polytechnic Institutes of Viana do Castelo and Coimbra (from CTESP and Degree) to motivate young people to be interested. It is, again, due to historical themes and its cultural identity, the main lines of which will be developed in this work. This methodology has been increasingly used in polytechnic higher education in Portugal (Amante & Fernandes, 2022; Costa et al, 2022; Figueiredo et al, 2021; Valduga & Balão, 2023)

Methodology | Being a research work with character and project design – inspired by the demola model, of Finnish inspiration – it was developed over the course of an academic semester, its methodological foundations were a qualitative approach, with contributions from a constructivist and epistemologically active educational perspective , supported by action research of a participatory nature, grounded theory and the broad lines of transdisciplinary action of the social and human sciences, particularly in the field of Historical and Heritage Education, in its relationship with Tourism. The study also uses important techniques such as biographical narrative, field notes/logbooks and documentary analysis.

Main results and contributions | Tourism Education (Airey, 2016) – articulated with Historical and Heritage Education (Wu, 2021) – being a naturally interdisciplinary scientific area, has emerged in the literature as a relevant and substantive topic (UNWTO, 2022) that matters , however, delve deeper. Through this investigation, with a fine-grained look at the lens of Historical and Heritage Education (one of the vectors that seems fundamental to us in Sustainable and Quality Tourism Education), it is clear that young people who currently enter higher education or access a degree master's degrees (essentially born in the late 1990s and early 2000s), present confusing and abstract ideas regarding the construction of their historical thinking and do not show motivation to develop specific knowledge and skills in this domain, so important for their personal and professional valorization, in a world that is increasingly “disfigured” culturally. It follows from a more attentive and careful look that their cultural consumption habits – related to reading, attending shows and exhibitions, visiting museums and other countries – do not seem to be particularly developed, despite an increasingly broad offer and, often economically adjusted (in cost) to their age group. Despite the undeniable opportunities that new digital technologies have brought, their potential does not seem to be fully integrated into the construction of a more intentional and active historical and heritage consciousness. Is this divorce the result of a negative past experience in the teaching of History, particularly in Primary and Secondary Education? What relationship does the Family establish in the patrimonial and identity link that is fundamental in the construction of young people’s historical knowledge? These are some of the issues that, from our point of view, must be worked on at the basis so that the next generations can look at these topics in a more motivating and intentional way, essential in the development of civic skills and critical structuring thinking in these times. threateningly “liquid” (as Baumann called it) that we live in. Despite the manifest “numbness” and relative lack of curiosity regarding knowledge of the past and all the challenges – and difficulties – already listed, we see that there is a positive potential for valuing History and Heritage which, if properly framed, can mean significant change in the coming decades.

Limitations | This study presents, from the outset, as a limitation, the sample that was used: in the case of the questionnaire applied, it was a convenience sample, as it was applied to students and classes in which the author of this work taught in the previous academic year. . Regarding the project developed with the 6 students during the semester, the choice was made for a computer platform associated with the Demola project, on which the research was carried out. There is also a temporal limitation as the project was notably located in the second academic semester of the year 2022-2023. Some of these limitations sought to be overcome in comparative reading with similar studies of youth historical consciousness that were carried out in different geographies (Rusvitaningrum et al, 2018; Santos, 2021 and Syahputra & Ardianto, 2020).

Conclusions | From the diagnosis of the central problem to a proposal for concrete action based on practical work with young university students, we conclude that the paradigm shift that seems urgent and fundamental to us can only occur within family and school contexts. The Family and the School share responsibilities in the areas of Historical and Heritage Education. The fact that this project is framed within active educational methodologies of co-creation and design thinking (Demola approach) that propose a response to real community challenges, through a wide range of transversal skills, seems to us to be a way forward. This change will only occur if the work is articulated and coordinated between Schools (of all levels of education) and Families and, therefore, the proposals that service learning also appear to us as relevant in a true collaborative, dynamic and community.