Original Score

In 1989, Lebanese deputies gathered in Taif and agreed on the consolidation of history and civic education textbooks in Lebanon. Yet a unified history textbook has never been completed. Instead, several history books continue to reflect different interpretations of the country’s past.

A History Lesson follows history classes in five different schools in Greater Beirut. Although fourth-year students study a standardized curriculum based on the 1970 edition, contradictions emerge through interviews with students from different backgrounds and affiliations. The film explores how the teaching of history reflects a country whose own history has remained contested since Lebanon’s independence in 1943.