What Happened to the Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults?
From Leili Amir-Arjmand to Hamed Alamaty, what has happened to the Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults? The non-specialized, nepotistic, and connection-based appointments in Ebrahim Raisi’s government have reached their peak. However, now a completely political appointment unrelated to the objectives of an institution meant to foster the growth and creativity of children and teenagers has drawn the ire of those in the field.
The newly appointed managing director of the Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults was previously the Secretary-General of the Union of Islamic Student Associations and the Director-General of Parliamentary Affairs at the Islamic Propaganda Organization, with no background in literary and artistic creation or understanding of that world. As Ali Asghar Seyedabadi, a journalist and writer in the field of children and youth, wrote, this appointment is not only an insult to all creators of cultural and artistic works for children and young adults, but also a severe blow to the independence of the institute, reducing its role to formal education and propaganda.
The Institute in its First 13 Years
The first and last managing director of the institute before the revolution was Leili Amir-Arjmand, a friend of Farah Pahlavi, who held the position for 13 years. Those 13 years were the peak period of the institute’s prosperity and productivity. Libraries were established in various cities, and many children and teenagers became members of the institute’s centers. Numerous novice artists began their cultural and artistic activities during this period with the institute’s support, producing valuable works, some of which won international awards. Notable figures like Nasser Taghvai, Abbas Kiarostami, Nooreddin Zarrinkelk, Bahram Beyzai, Amir Naderi, and Farshid Mesghali collaborated with the institute, benefiting both themselves and the institute.
The Leftists in the Institute
Although the Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults was founded with the support of Farah Pahlavi and continued to receive this support throughout its activity, it was not governed by a narrow political view, and there was no strictness against the presence and activity of individuals with opposing or critical political backgrounds of the Pahlavi regime. For instance, a figure like Firooz Shirvanloo, a member of Parviz Nikkhah’s group and one of the accused in the attempted assassination of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who was also detained for a time, was in charge of the institute’s publications.
It is said that he played a significant role in the development of the institute’s activities. The trust in this cultural figure with a leftist background was such that after leaving the institute, he became an art advisor in Farah’s office. Shirvanloo was a member of the Iranian Students Confederation with leftist tendencies. It is said that recruiting elites for the institute was Shirvanloo’s work. He invited people like M. Azad, Siavash Kasraei, Nader Ebrahimi, Manouchehr Neyestani, and Samad Behrangi to collaborate for the advancement of children’s literature. Samad Behrangi’s ‘The Little Black Fish,’ a symbolic protest text against the political system, was published by the institute’s publications with Shirvanloo’s support.
The Extinguishing of the Institute’s Light
This dynamism and diversity in the institute’s productions faded after the revolution with the loss of its independence and its conversion into a subdivision of the Ministry of Education. The first managing director was Seyed Kamal Kharazi, the Foreign Minister during the reform era. After him, Alireza Zarrin, Mohsen Chini Foroushan, Seyed Sadegh Rezaei, Alireza Hajian Zadeh, Fazel Nazari, Mehdi Ali Akbarzadeh, and now recently Hamed Alamaty have been appointed to this position.
Ali Asghar Seyedabadi recently wrote in an Instagram post about this appointment: ‘The day I heard Fazel Nazari became the managing director of the Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults, I thought it was a wrong choice. I wrote a short note explaining my reasons. However, the newly appointed managing director is a truly strange choice that undermines the institute’s foundational philosophy.’
Fazel Nazari, at least, was a poet and had a hand in literature. Granted, his orientation might not have been to our liking, but we thought that within the same orientation, where no one outside it was likely to be chosen, there were others with a hand in literature and art for children who were preferable to him. Now, however, no matter how much I scrutinize the resume of this new manager, I can’t find even a thin thread connecting him to the institute’s function. He has no relation to the institute and has taken this position based on a misunderstanding of the Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults.
This misunderstanding has a history. The crooked foundation was laid when the institute lost its independence and became a subsidiary of the Ministry of Education. The institute, which was fundamentally about nurturing thought, imagination, and creativity, and had defined its mission as building libraries and producing cultural and artistic products, became an appendage of the Ministry of Education and fell into the confinement of a narrow formal education perspective.