INTERCULTURAL EDUCATION IN MEXICO: HISTORICAL BACKGROUND (COLONIAL PERIOD AND INDEPENDENCE)

Abstract

This article presents the results of a historical-pedagogical research, which objective was to determine the features of Mexican intercultural education in the colonial era and during the period of Independence. The authors conclude that in colonial times, Mexico has challenged the construction of a single national identity, imposing a European language and culture on a multicultural territory with Amerindian roots. From this, the harmony of Mexican society is sought (until today), the idea of involving minorities, which are groups of Mexican people who have been marginalized for having different ideologies with respect to the majority culture, persists. In the 16th century in the colony, the strategies used by the evangelizers for teaching Christian culture and Castilian to the conquered people were designed: education was traced as a conquest with the Franciscan missions. During the teaching of the Castilian language, which had the objective of evangelizing and obeying the monarchy, since it was considered the official language of the crown, some innovative didactic practices were designed. The time of the Independence of Mexico (1810) represented the dissidence of secular oppression. That is to say, the assimilation that implies the passive state of a culture in relation to another, the dominant culture, which considers it a superior culture, was implemented. After the Mexican Independence (1810) and revolutionary struggles (1910), pedagogy tried to strengthen culture and Spanish as the de facto language. In short, although it can be found certain connotation of intercultural education in pre-Hispanic multicultural society, nevertheless both periods analyzed, the colonial era and that of Independence, are characterized by processes of psychological acculturation, something very distant, even opposed to intercultural education. At the same time, certain of its features are observed in the process of indigenous languages´ studying by Catholic missionaries.