CUOMO-1 ART  Celebrating the Quincentenary, by Matilda R.
  Cuomo, in culturefront, May 1992, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 7-8.
 
     The Quincentenary of Columbus's voyage of discovery offers
  Americans an unprecedented opportunity to renew their
  understanding of the fifteenth century events that shaped and
  formed our twentieth century world.  During this anniversary
  year, programs, observances, and publications in countless
  languages are evaluating the impact of Columbus's voyage, and
  challenging us to regard it more closely and critically than
  ever before.  Never has it been clearer that Columbus's
  extraordinary journey from the Old World to the New changed
  forever our geographic, economic, cultural, commercial, and
  political interrelationships.
 
     Of course, we have long known that Columbus did not
  suddenly materialize as an adventurous explorer ready to
  conquer a world many of his contemporaries believed flat and
  abbreviated.  In fact, Columbus's own story before his Atlantic
  voyages merits more serious consideration by students and
  teachers.  He was the son of a weaver, born and raised in
  Genoa.  Stranded in Portugal by a shipwreck at age 25, he
  realized that improving his navigational and sailing skills
  could enable him to embark on a search for a route to the
  riches of the East.
 
     In the fifteenth century, by age 25 one had reached
  today's equivalent of being well beyond mid-life, virtually of
  retirement age.  Considering that Columbus needed financing and
  a patron to realize his dream, his fearless commitment to a
  voyage into the unknown at age 41 is all the more remarkable.
  And this aspect of the Columbus story remains an invaluable
  tool for teaching youngsters that they may dare to dream, and
  that creativity and determination still make an enormous
  difference--and sometimes an enormous contribution.
 
     During the Quincentenary, educators have expanded the
  Columbus syllabus to encompass the study of the entire broad
  concept of "discovery," a creative approach affording
  opportunities to examine discovery in its fullest application:
  to science, art, psychology, law, and the basic principles of
  the social sciences and humanities.  From these perspectives,
  the subject engages teacher and pupil alike, encouraging re-evaluation of many
 long-held theories found in the vast body of
  works about Columbus the man, the explorer, the leader, the
  visionary, as well as about the cultures he found--and
  attempted to change--here in the Americas.
 
     Thanks to the generosity of the governments of Spain and
  Italy, respectively, both an Ibero Heritage curriculum and an
  Italian-America Heritage curriculum will be introduced into our
  schools next year.  They are part of a wider effort by our
  State's Christopher Columbus Quincentenary Commission, which I
  chair, to use the opportunity this anniversary presents to
  expand the teaching of diversity to all of our students.
 
     A balanced, gripping syllabus will neither sentimentalize
  Columbus nor romanticize the world he found here.  An unbiased
  presentation would provide a true, vivid, picture of fifteenth-century life on
 both sides of the Atlantic--seen according to
  fifteenth-century values--and would at its best avoid the
  application of our modern, enlightened perspectives to men and
  women who lived half a millennium in the past.  Most important
  of all, such a curriculum could engage more children in the
  adventure of learning in all disciplines--and surely no one
  questions the urgent need to encourage our young people to stay
  in school.
 
     By challenging our traditional way of teaching and
  thinking, the new curricula can open doors to new thinking that
  may serve to enlarge our sense of "what was" and complete a
  story left unfinished for too long.
 
     In the context of his own times, Columbus's attitude
  toward the peoples he found in the Americas reflected the
  universal lack of knowledge about these indigenous populations.
  Today's sensibility invites us to examine and, where
  appropriate, to celebrate the cultures of both worlds, Old and
  New--to teach and rediscover through Columbus and his ethic of
  discovery, the best in ourselves--and particularly in our
  students!
 
     The intermingling of cultures and customs is at the heart
  of the original promise of American society.  We are nurtured
  by the cross-pollination of diverse political systems,
  religions, traditions, and moral values.
 
     The strength of the United States lies in our acceptance--indeed, our appre
ciation--of our multicultural backgrounds.  By
  celebrating our differences, we bind ourselves together with
  the common threads of liberty, equality, justice, and
  democracy--the system invented in Columbus's world, but
  perfected in ours.
 
     New York State, the first to celebrate Columbus Day some
  200 years ago, was also the first to make it a legal holiday,
  and our Quincentenary Commission was established on October 12,
  1988. The Commission's goal is to assure that the Columbus
  Anniversary becomes a memorable learning experience for all New
  Yorkers, all Americans, and people from all over the world who
  will be in New York during the Quincentenary Year.
 
     In partnership with the Imagination Celebration, the
  State's Arts-In-Education Program, the Commission will reach
  out to children, through the school and library systems of the
  State, with the 1992 theme--"Seeking New Horizons."  The New
  York State Music Association has also agreed to "adopt"
  Columbus for 1992.
 
     Throughout the state, our racial and ethnic diversity will
  be on display in school projects, museum exhibits, musical and
  theatrical performances, art shows, scholarly symposia, and all
  manner of traditional and innovative celebrations and events.
 
     For our youngsters, the Commission is creating a new
  children's book about Columbus, telling the story of our
  origins as a multicultural nation and global community, and
  examining our reasons for celebrating Columbus Day.  We hope it
  will inspire young readers of all cultures to identify with
  Columbus's dream and foster their awareness of the limitless
  opportunities for exploration and discovery in the future.
 
     The Quincentenary offers us an opportunity to become
  better informed about our shared history; to dispel the myths
  and fallacies that linger about both Columbus and the political
  culture of the Italy of the late fifteenth century and to
  understand better the full extent of Columbus's contributions
  and the contributions of all the ethnic groups that followed
  him to the New World.
 
     We know and appreciate the efforts that our social studies
  and humanities teachers are making to enhance their own
  programs.  Their efforts will make this historic event even
  more meaningful for our students.  We hope they will also use
  the Quincentenary to promote understanding and respect for
  other's traditions.  By honoring our right to be different, we
  strengthen the ties that unite us.
 
     The 1992 observances--both here in New York and
  nationwide--will help us to renew our appreciation of
  Columbus's contributions.  they will compel us to examine
  closely the culture he found and revolutionized and to
  acknowledge his courage and perseverance as well as his
  limitations.  Most of all, it will encourage us to rejoice in
  the Family of New York whose diversity was born of his
  discovery, and remains--500 years after Columbus--the greatest
  asset of the greatest state in the greatest country in the
  world.