History of poetry in Mexican textbooks

Abstract

This article aims to analyze the evolution of the use of poetry in Mexican primary level textbooks. The analyzed corpus consisted of the books with the most significant changes, those from 1962, 1972, and 2008, for a total of 35 books. The main results indicate that the role of poetry in textbooks has changed considerably in response to different educational, cultural, and political conceptions. The 1962 books mainly feature acclaimed Romantic and Modernist writers and have a strong interest in promoting patriotic and moral values. The 1972 books lean towards Mexican folk lyricism and have a more playful tone, marked by rounds, songs, and poems for playing. Finally, the 2008 books prioritize functional reading development, leading to a notable reduction in the importance of literary models, especially poetry. This analysis demonstrates the differences in how these anthologies were constructed, how they relate to their historical context, and provides some guidelines on how to improve the didactics of poetry in textbooks in the future.