THE RECOGNITION OF SAME-SEX COMMON-LAW MARRIAGES UNDER THE PERSPECTIVE OF LEGAL MOBILIZATION: THE ROLE OF THE LGBTQIA+ COMMUNITY IN THEIR OWN LEGAL CONQUESTS

• Grant number: 24/05047-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: November 01, 2024
• End date: October 31, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Law
• Principal Investigator: Agnaldo de Sousa Barbosa
• Grantee: Alexandra Valle Goi
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Ciências Humanas e Sociais (FCHS). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Franca. Franca , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Speech is performative and disposes of a certain worldview, with its net of beliefs and desires, as explains Jurandir Freire Costa. Therefore, the ways of referring to each group of people express values, so being that, with time, vocabulary was used to exclude and discriminate, as has happened with "homosexuality". Alongside that, within legal mobilization, it is discussed Justice in the perspective of its users, given that interest groups and categories are capable of influence and intervention on legal decisions, when they manifest and are active. And so, Justice is constructed social and historically. By connecting both of these exposed ideas, an analysis and investigation of ADI 4.277 and ADPF 132 of STF, the decision that recognized same-sex common-law marriages and turned them legally equal to their heterosexual counterpart, is made. This research aims to place the aforementioned legal case under the perspective of legal mobilization, as in to discover what was the impact, in quality and extension, of social movements over the case's result, the rights that were conquered, and also if the language of the LGBTQIA+ movement modified the lexicon of the justices' votes. Pierre Bourdieu claimed that Law is relatively autonomous, because, beyond its technical aspect, the power relations that take place in society produce efects on Law's mechanics. Hence, each rights' interpretation is an appropriation of symbolic power and antagonizes with other interpretations in the "social space". Thus, the case can be seen as a confrontation between agents, each with their respective interpretation and power. The Law's arguments used in the dispute will be analysed in consonance with the doctrine's ideas. At last, the methodological reference will consist of: studies concerning legal mobilization and Queer theory; work, articles that indicate the history of the LGBTQIA+, how were the manifestations and activism until that moment; matters of language; and finally literature about Law, that can assist in the comprehension of legislation and of the rights and principles assured by the Constitution. Furthermore, the material and fonts will correspond to the law case at hand, ADI 4.277 and ADPF 132, as of academic texts and newspapers' articles which reference the theme or related theme and documents made by LGBTQIA+ organizations, frequently quantitative. Consequently, it will be possible to study this litigation in the perspective of its users, of who fights for their rights, the inquiry of speech, social ideology and linguistic terms, and in the perspective of the language of rights that is utilized in the justices' votes.