Estereótipos de gênero no Curso Técnico Integrado em Informática do Centro de Educação Profissional "Senador Jessé Pinto Freire"

Abstract

The study was developed at the Graduate Program in Education (PPGED) of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN). It emerged from the scarcity of publications, in the epistemological field of Professional Education (PE) in the state of Rio Grande do Norte (RN), about studies on gender stereotypes related to the choice of vocational courses by students. Thus, we justify the need for our investigation, taking into account the overlaps between these stereotypes and these choices. The study had as general objective to problematize the option of the students for the Technical Course in Computer Technology in the face of gender stereotypes in the state network of Vocational Education. For specific objectives, we aimed to (1) build a theoretical and historical reference of female education, focused on qualification for work specifically in the Potiguar context; (2) diagnose the places occupied by women in the guiding documents and in the data of Vocational Education in RN; and (3) reveal ruptures and continuities in the students' speeches concerning their professional preferences in confrontation with gender stereotypes within the Integrated Technical Course in Informatics at Professional Education Center "Senador Jessé Pinto Freire” (CENEP-SJPF). The study took place in the light of the theoretical framework of gender studies in dialogue with theorists of Professional Education. The methodological approach of the research is qualitative, exploratory in nature. In order to build the research corpus, we made use of the documentary film "Feministas: what were they thinking?" (2018). As a methodological strategy, we used the Film Analysis Form, in addition to a socioeconomic and demographic questionnaire, a focus group and a semi-structured interview. The collected and constructed data were analysed through Discursive Textual Analysis (DTA) proposed by Moraes and Galiazzi (2006). The results showed that the Computer Technology course in RN has a male predominance, and is still a field of study and performance considered for men, marked by stereotypes inherited from the patriarchy. However, the study revealed a growing increase in girls taking the course each year. As for the students' choices for a vocational course, we found that they are mostly guided by their relatives, also taking into account the social expectations of each family. Most of the time, the choice for a professional course in the area of information technology occurs due to the persuasion of men of their acquaintance who already work in this field. We also inferred that the girls interviewed had already been through some situation in which they suffered discrimination or gender prejudice by the students or during the internship, although at the time they did not realize the violence they suffered and were subjected to as a result of the patriarchal legacy, as well as of male dominance. We found out to be of the essence that gender is treated as a social and cultural contruct, in order to subvert the conservative idiology that is anchored in the heteronormative pattern, which perpetuates that kind of symbolic violence and implies directly into socio-sexual division of labor. We conclude this work by pointing out the urgent need for education and training actually based on integral human formation for gender equity, not only in the area of the Computer Technology vocational course, the focus of this dissertation, but in all areas of Professional Education in the state.