Edukacja regionalna a przemiany społeczności przemysłowych – tworzenie tradycji jako wyzwanie edukacyjne – na przykładzie Zagłębia Dąbrowskiego

Many regions of Europe are witnessing the reconstruction of regional identity, especially in places where radical social, cultural and economic changes occur. Economic restructuring is a factor of particular importance – it has always affected the stability of units such as a region, town and sometimes even a country. In Poland, this is well visible in the Silesian Voivodship, including in one of its sub-regions, the Dąbrowa Basin, presented in the paper. This young region, created as a result of 19-century pan-European industrialization, is inhabited mainly by descendants of immigrants from rural and small-town areas of Lesser Poland (Małopolska). Attempts have begun in many local groups and circles to strengthen the region’s identity – a process often accompanied by the creation of this identity and by inventing and hand-picking passages of the region’s history that serve this purpose. This poses a significant challenge for regional education where a serious dilemma appears: how to tackle invented tradition, how to evaluate it and what functions to assign to it.