Natureza e comunidades tradicionais nos livros didáticos de Ciências Humanas e Sociais Aplicadas: distopias do capital e a precarização da educação no Brasil

Abstract

The main objective of this research is to analyze the textbooks of the "New" High School, understanding them as a material expression of the dismantling of public education in Brazil. Through Marxist theoretical frameworks, especially linked to historical-critical pedagogy, activity theory, and Marxist ecology, we address the counter-reform of High School and contextualize the textbooks as commodities serving capital and its representatives. Our considerations begin with the initial contributions of Marx and Engels regarding the ontological role of labor in the development process of human beings, its significance for the educational process, and consequently, how its appropriation by the capitalist mode of production subverts its formative functions, subjecting them to expropriation and exploitation. We regard the textbooks of the "New" High School as research sources, that is, as carriers of historicity embedded in the capitalist mode of production and determined by it. Our thematic focus was directed at the representations they reproduce regarding "nature" and "traditional communities," as well as their interaction in contemporary times. We demonstrate how the textbooks present these themes and then critique and enhance their considerations through the analytical categories of "ideology," "capitalist realism," "labor," and "metabolism." Through the theoretical framework, we highlight how education has been subverted by intellectuals and organic companies linked to the bourgeoisie to operate according to their own interests, but also point out pedagogical possibilities for overcoming the limits imposed by capital through conscious and planned teaching practice, that is, the historicity of educational agents and education. During the investigation, it was possible to perceive the reactionary nature of the textbooks, both in relation to nature and traditional communities and their interaction in contemporary times. Their purpose is to highlight and legitimize capitalism. We indicate our contribution to the public debate surrounding the "New" High School and the need for its immediate revocation by highlighting how it has negated the future of generations of students. Finally, we advocate for quality public education that is critical, secular, and develops students to their full potential.