Influence and interference of the colonial education system on the curriculum in Angola, its permanence and maintenance

Abstract

The Portuguese colonial educational system in Angola, guided by assimilationism and the training of subordinate labor, established a Eurocentric and restrictive curriculum that perpetuated relations of dependence. Colonial influence left deep marks, evidenced by the valorization of the Portuguese language to the detriment of national languages and by the exclusion of local cultures. In this way, basic education was structured for subordination, consequently limiting access to higher levels of schooling. From this perspective, based on a decolonial approach, this study seeks to understand the persistence of Western thought in the Angolan curriculum, understood as a strong colonial and neocolonial legacy. Such a legacy reveals an epistemological dependence that privileges European authors, philosophies, and educational models—especially Portuguese ones—over local African knowledge. Thus, although Angola has achieved independence, the educational system still faces significant challenges in detaching itself from this Eurocentric matrix. According to Cruz (2022), the decolonial perspective presents itself as an alternative—that is, a new way of thinking, being, acting, and constructing—that breaks with the chronologies established by the paradigms of modernity and is intrinsically connected to border thinking. This, in turn, consists, above all, in the epistemic singularity that underpins any decolonial project. In this sense, building this path of transgression requires disengagement from modern/colonial values historically presented as universal and absolute.