The survival of life: an anthropological study of the suffering and mental health of high school students in public education in São Paulo

• Grant number: 23/05482-5
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master
• Start date: August 01, 2023
• End date: December 20, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Anthropology
• Principal Investigator: Júlio Assis Simões
• Grantee: Higor Breno Cagnoni Silva
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated scholarship(s): 24/14940-0 - Grammars and experiences of affliction: an anthropological approach to the life cycle of young people at a vocational high school in São Paulo, BE.EP.MS

Abstract

With the aim of investigating the modes of expression of suffering mobilized by high school students, this research proposes the realization of an ethnography of the interpersonal fabric of emotions present in the daily life of a public high school. Based on an interdisciplinary theoretical framework, focusing on the scientific methodology of anthropology, the study also seeks to problematize the use of diagnoses and "psi" categories within the school environment, with the intention of observing how the social production of illness episodes occurs psychic, focusing on the rounds of negotiations involved in obtaining public recognition of pain. To this end, the idea of illness as an experience will be articulated, that is, a dynamic process of affective self-perception, guided not only by the attempt to inhabit another body shape, but also by the mutual crossings of the different agents that make up the high school scene. n this sense, we seek to understand how the notions of "health" and "suffering" are present in the daily lives of students and other research participants, in order to identify which language modality they use to give meaning to the experiences of discomfort. Finally, based on the collected data, the possible relationships between the sufferings pointed out by the young people and the different social markers of difference (sex, gender, race, class and disability) will be traced.