Alternative pedagogiche e costruzione di spazi per lo sviluppo di un pensiero critico sull’educazione: la collana editoriale «Il Puntoemme» nell’Italia degli anni Settanta

The essay aims at highlighting the rise of a critical thought on education within the Italian framework, during the Seventies, for the cultural enterprise carried on by a revolutionary book collection in educational studies named «Il Puntoemme». The book collection started in 1971 and survived till 1985, having its best time in the middle of the Seventies. The book series conveyed a plurality of different voices coming from the radical cultures aligned in that revolutionary period. A survey on the main topics characterizing the cultural address showed by the publications appeared under the emblem «Il Puntoemme» looks very interesting to get the critical spirit animating the editorial enterprise. It supported the development of a lot of educational issues coming from the area of the contemporary «counter-cultures»: the need for a not-authoritative education, the commitment for new morals corresponding to the sexual emancipation, the reveal of the ideological elements framing the traditional beliefs in social education, the disclose of the hidden curriculum at school, the encouragement of the cooperative methods as matching the essence of the democratic conduct, and so on. In so far, the radical perspectives supported by «Il Puntoemme» collection clearly showed its rooting into an antagonistic character typical of the Seventies, often inspiring the assumption of radical solutions, like the demand for a complete dismantling of the educational settings or the more proper deinstitutionalization of education.