Colonial education in the Congo - a question of “uncritical” pedagogy until the bitter end?

Abstract

Our approach is a historical, and not a theoretical or a philosophical one. But such an approach might be of help to understand the complexities and ambiguities of the pedagogical mentalities in the course of the twentieth century. As is usually the case in historical research the groundwork has to precede the formulation of hypotheses, let alone theories about the nature of pedagogical practices. Therefore, since the 1990s, “we” (as a team) have been busy studying the history of education in the former Belgian Congo. Of course since then we have not only closely monitored the theoretical and methodological developments in the field of colonial historiography, but have ourselves also contributed to that history. This article tries to give an overview of some of our analyses, concentrating on the question to what extend the Belgian offensive of colonial (i.e. mainly Catholic) missionary education, which was almost exclusively targeted at “paternalism”, contributed to the development of personal life, individual autonomy and/or emancipation of the natives. From the rear-view mirror of history we are, among other things, zooming in on the crucial 1950s, during which decade thoughts first turned to the education of a (very limited) “elite”. The thesis we are using in this respect is that the “mental space” of colonialism was not of a nature as to have a very great widening of consciousness among the local population as its effect.

Confronting “dark” colonial pasts: a historical analysis of practices of representation in Belgian and Congolese schools, 1945–2015

“…Au Congo, une tension similaire est évidente dans la disjonction entre une rhétorique dominante en faveur d'une décolonisation immédiate de l'éducation et de ses objectifs, et des pratiques de représentation qui peinent à s'éloigner du savoir colonial en raison de structures et de systèmes de production du savoir profondément ancrés. En examinant des pratiques de représentation à l'intérieur d'un thème spécifique dans une discipline scolaire, cette étude a ainsi contribué, à un micro-niveau, à l'argument général avancé par des historiens de l'éducation selon lequel l'« éducationalisation » n'est pas un processus univoque et clairement défini, mais un processus à caractère multiple et ambigu, qui englobe des objectifs divergents et souvent contradictoires 147 .…”

Why Even Today Educational Historiography is not an Unnecessary Luxury. Focusing on four Themes from Forty-four Years of Research

“…The educational initiative in the former Belgian Congo was in any case man's handiwork, to which we made diverse contributions as of the mid-1990s. The most recent synthesis dates from 2017 (Depaepe, 2017). As a result, the demythologisation of the common discourse is also appropriate here.…”

Educating girls in Congo: An unsolved pedagogical paradox since colonial times?

“…With this 'grand' endeavour in mind, those involved were also far less inhibited when it came to allowing prevailing stereotypes to surface than they would have been in Europe. As we have stated elsewhere (Depaepe, 2017), teaching and education in the colony were, so to speak, like 'high-pressure cooking', to the extent that the characteristics, to include flaws and systemic failures of the Western model of education, became much more easily visible than they would have been in a complex form of society.…”