French textbooks and scholar programs of history and geography: identities, globalization and European construction (1995-2002)

Abstract

This paper analyses influences about the double process of globalization and construction of European identity at scholar official programs and at teaching contents showed in textbooks of history and geography at secondary terminal cycle in France between 1995 and 2002. The destructive and threatening aspects of globalization are regularly perceived and described at scholar works as a risk of lost of identity, came from cultural uniformity and social alienation. The manual highlights yet the differentiating effect that, at the same time, cause growth of inequalities and stimulates the resistance identity. About the possibility of constructing an European identity, above local and regional level of cultural diversity, as a whole, the manual and programs are carrying the same message which signs the selfwill and political character of these initiatives. The Europeanism of Europe remains problematic and the reference to European identity, which is defined through a common culture, is practically absent of manuals and the European identity is mentioned as a kind of humanistic perspective, at specific spaces, out of principal texts that developing the contents.