Curriculum as the Fluid for Times of Unsureness: In Between the Solid and the Liquid

Given that Portugal made its political democratization in 1974, educational policies began an orientation toward inclusion, equality, and equity after that time. Curriculum has been at the center of all educational reforms, and trends for flexibility, interdisciplinarity, and cooperation can be identified, namely, in the Curriculum Reorganization for Basic Education, of 2001, and the curriculum definition for basic and secondary education, of 2018. This chapter will look into Portuguese curriculum history after the democratic revolution to see how it has been adapted to the needs and conditions created by the present liquid times. Based on the context of the present pandemic crisis, the argument is that curriculum needs to be inscribed in a narrative paradigm where its properties allow both contextual adaption and resistance. Considering this fluid condition, curriculum will be analyzed in a way that will allow the finding of critical elements and external conditions for teaching and learning processes that enable it to be assumed in a viscous state. Assuming that one of the visible effects of the various processes of globalization has been that society has become more individualistic, the concept of refraction will be used to understand how curriculum policies have been developed at different levels of their construction. In this context, teachers’ narratives will be key to identifying the dialectic relation between internal curriculum elements, external conditions, and results.