How to Write a Textbook for Schools and Universities Based on Traditional Values

This article addresses the problem of developing a methodology for new textbooks in the humanities for Russian schools and universities, in light of the growing public interest in upbringing and the strengthening of traditional values. The aim of the study is to formulate a value and cultural model that makes it possible to create a textbook oriented toward fostering patriotism and the fundamental spiritual values of Russia. The relevance of the research stems from the traditionalist turn in Russia’s internal life and the search for ways out of late liberalism and secularism in educational policy. The novelty of the problem lies in highlighting the importance of methodology for new humanities textbooks in Russia, in contrast to the dominant discussions about modes of content delivery. The study analyzes the principles underlying the preparation of Russian textbooks in the post-Soviet 1990s, which employed approaches from Western social sciences. Their features and certain negative aspects are described, and their methodological model is schematically presented. In contrast, a value and cultural model is proposed, one oriented towards explaining all aspects of a people’s life through the role of values fundamental to that culture. The author argues that the prevailing approach in the humanities continues to subordinate values to social circumstances, which are themselves seen as products of social laws. As a result, good and evil are defined by those who acquire the financial and political power to shape social conditions—reproducing a secular and colonial version of the principle “they who have the power, establish the faith”. Within such a framework, traditional values cannot serve as a legitimate argument in determining the laws and objective reality of a people. The value and cultural model, by contrast, offers an alternative view of cultural history: its fundamental values in the life of peoples that precede and determine social institutions. This perspective opens the possibility of employing traditional values as arguments in shaping paths of socio-political development. The findings may help displace the methodological dependence of the humanities on Western value models within Russian education.

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