Teachers´ perceptions about gender, sexuality and homophobia: reflecting on continuous teacher training in the view of practice accounts

Author(s)

Liane Kelen Rizzato

• Document type: Master's Dissertation
• Press: São Paulo.
• Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Educação (FE/SBD)
• Defense date: 2013-04-11

Examining board members

Claudia Pereira Vianna; Belmira Amelia de Barros Oliveira Bueno; Célia Regina Rossi

• Advisor: Claudia Pereira Vianna

Abstract

The purpose of this dissertation is to understand the perceptions of male and female teachers about gender, sexuality and homophobia, as well as the way they deal with such themes in their teaching practice. It is an investigation of qualitative nature whose research subjects were teachers from public schools in the State of São Paulo who participated in a training course called Living together with Sexual Diversity in the School, conducted in 2007 through the partnership between two NGOs and funded by the Ministry of Education (MEC) and by the Special Secretariat of Human Rights (SEDH), in compliance with the policy for ongoing teacher training in gender and sexuality. The theoretical and methodological tools utilized in the empirical research consisted of documental analyses, questionnaires and in-depth interviews. When examining the materials collected, emphasis was given to the theoretical elaborations on teacher training, gender relations, sexuality, homophobia and, especially, on the concept of social experience. Assuming a post-structuralist perspective, the study of homophobia closely knitted with gender and sexuality served as the framework to discuss distinctive processes which organize a sort of gender surveillance and act as normative forces upon the institution of teaching identities. The contradictions and dissonances found in the speeches of both male and female teachers provide evidence that the construction of the social experience in the homophobia they deal with shows the same dynamics of productionreproductions- resistance revealed by the school in regard of gender relations and sexuality in general. In the context analyzed here, the combination of several logics of action and multiple existences of social relations made teachers keep their prejudice based on gender identity and sexual orientation. On the other hand, both male and female teachers´ empathy towards a student who acknowledges him/herself as being non-heterosexual and, especially, the inclusion of such empathic experience in his/her view of sexual diversity turned out to be a key factor in overcoming prejudices and stereotypes associated with this theme, resulting in significant transgressions of the heteronormative patterns usually adopted for sexuality. (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 09/11392-1 - Gender, sexuality and homophobia: a study of in-service teacher education policies in the Lula administration
• Grantee: Liane Kelen Rizzato
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master