Educação para a sexualidade e formação docente: desafios e possibilidades a partir de Paulo Freire em tempos de retrocessos, silenciamentos e resistências

Abstract

This thesis presents research on sexuality education in the context of teacher training, based on Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed, in a scenario characterized by democratic setbacks, institutional silencing, and intense moral disputes in the field of education, a situation that has become more pronounced in recent decades. The study aims to analyze the contributions of a research-training process, anchored in Freirean thought, to the constitution of critical, ethical, and socially committed teaching practices aimed at transforming the reality of schools. In this sense, it seeks to highlight how such practices can strengthen teaching autonomy, promote a dialogical and inclusive school culture, confront prejudice and inequality, and consolidate the school as a space for citizen formation, respect for diversity, and human emancipation. The theoretical framework articulates Paulo Freire’s central categories, extreme situations, extreme acts, being more, and unprecedentedly viable, in dialogue with authors of critical pedagogy and popular education, such as Moacir Gadotti, Miguel Arroyo, Carlos Rodrigues Brandão, Henry Giroux, Adolfo Sánchez Vázquez, István Mészáros, and Ernst Bloch, in addition to fundamental contributions from bell hooks, Catherine Walsh, Vera Maria Candau, and Ana Maria Araújo Freire, who challenge Freirean thought from dialectically articulated, intercultural, and feminist perspectives, broadening the understanding of oppression and formative processes. Methodologically, the research is characterized as qualitative, participatory, and formative, developed through a continuing education course designed as a researchtraining device, involving teachers from basic education. The data were produced from questionnaires, dialogical records, and experience reports, and analyzed in light of Content Analysis articulated with Freirean categories. The results show that Sexuality Education, when developed in dialogical and problematizing training processes, contributes to overcoming biologizing, normative, and silencing conceptions, favoring the expansion of critical teacher awareness, the confrontation of oppressive practices, and the construction of viable innovations in everyday school life. It is concluded that Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed constitutes a powerful theoreticalmethodological reference for teacher training in the field of Sexuality Education, as it enables the articulation between critical reflection, pedagogical praxis, and ethicalpolitical commitment to social justice, democracy, and human emancipation. As an outcome of the investigative and training process, an educational product was produced in the form of an almanac on Sexuality Education, conceived as critical and dialogical teaching material, intended to support emancipatory pedagogical practices in elementary schools.