Exhibiting, Disseminating, Promoting, and Circulating School Objects, Symbols, and Artefacts

This article analyses the role of Universal and National Exhibitions—particularly the Brazilian Centenary commemorations—as arenas for promoting social, industrial, and educational modernities in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Using primary sources such as official reports, commemorative albums, catalogues, medals, and photographic records, as well as journals including Revista A Illustração and Revista Nacional, it explores how these events functioned as showcases of material culture and pedagogical innovation. The discussion is informed by historiographical perspectives from Hobsbawm, Nóvoa, Escolano Benito, and Pesavento, framing the exhibitions as part of broader processes of nation-building and the invention of traditions. Methodologically, the article adopts a historical-cultural approach, intersecting the history of education with the study of materiality. Findings indicate that these exhibitions not only reinforced projects of modernisation but also contributed to the diffusion of schooling practices, educational repertoires, and materials—including Montessori apparatus and school furniture—thereby aligning Brazil with international movements of active and progressive education.