ON THE BENEFITS OF TEACHING AND LEARNING HISTORY

The question about the benefits of historical education is serious in the Polish cultural space. The most prominent Poles spoke about this issue. Marshal Józef Piłsudski, for example, said: "Who does not respect and does not value his past is not worthy of respect in the present or right for the future." The Nobel Prize winner Czesław Miłosz assured that: "Whoever talks about history is always safe." Pope John Paul II said this in a more emphatic manner, namely: "A nation that does not know its past dies and does not build the future." Our great countrymen were right. It's history that makes us Poles. Thanks to it, we have our own state, laws, symbols, language, culture, religion and national imaginarium. Thanks to historical education, we know the price and the rank of these values. We can talk about them, even telling alternative stories. We can feel pride, responsibility, admiration, assertiveness, aversion and hate. Historiography meets our integration, psychological, political, cultural, educational, social, artistic, folk, compensation and personal needs. It can be either a "big national flag" or a "quiet haven for hobbyists". This is what the above article is about.