EDUCATION NOW
Nucleus
Culture is an act of design, of preservation
of our heritage and of the development of collective memory, a dynamic
event of identity. In recent years a surprising social demand for
cultural rights has developed to fulfil the need for a varied and
individual subsistence, rights as strong as the right to health and
food. However, what chronic lacks are these demands expressing? What
are we demanding when we demand culture? Who is equipped to perceive
culture as a right?
As opposed to other activities that
must be anticipated by the State and supported by society in a
structured manner, culture is an open possibility, one that reflects
the intrinsic existence of the individual. Culture is part of the
individual identity of a person over and above the identity of the
community. Hence, the community should provide access, permanence and
free transit to the individual throughout all the expressions of
culture. It is not possible to pre-establish the limits nor the form of
this great operating arena. It is simply a matter of participating in
its construction. It is not just a question of encouraging the best
writers, but that books find their best interpreters and critical
readers in each society. Education has always been one of the means to
culture; and culture, one of the mechanisms to contain excesses of
power and systems.
Argentina has for some time back
forsaken the educational tradition that for many years defined her as a
society capable of generating culture, of possessing the tools to model
her heritage. First, dictatorships constrained this institution by
imposing other cultures; later, autocratic market policies simply
substituted cultural needs for a commitment to first world consumerism.
To reduce its responsibility, the State impressed on the people the
relationship between the abandonment of educational excellence and the
lack of economic resources to administrate it. But there is abundant
proof that it is a false relationship. It is a matter of decisions, of
plans, of the ideology of the leaders and the led.
Economies
are subject to too many swings of fortune to entrust them with the
planning of education. The country's culture needs a return to an
educational quality capable of controlling the ferocity of a market
that continues to claim victims among the excluded. Education is the
only thing that can promote development in democracy since, with
democracy, it is now necessary to achieve greater representation.
About this article
In tipoGrafica magazine 64, year: XVIII, December, January, February and March, 2004-05