Recognition and Social Disdain, or the Quandries of the Democracy in Contemporary Brazil: Some Considerations about the Racial Question

Authors

  • Paulo Sérgio Costa Neves Universidade Federal deSergipe

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5007/%25x

Abstract

In the last decades of the 20th century, the social struggles against the discrimination of minorities (ethnic, sexual etc.) forced onto the world public agenda some questions regarding the “right to difference” and “recognition”, giving new meanings to the concepts of democracy and justice. In Brazil, these issues appeared after the democratization of the country, in the 1980s, when social movements with demands of identity and respect of differences put into question the status-quo and unmasked dimensions of inequalities up to then not recognized, such as the existence os racial discrimination. This text reflects on the role of the demands for recognition in the overcoming of symbolic representations that naturalize and help to maintain the inequalities in the country and how affirmative actions may intervene in this problem. Keywords: recognition; affirmative actions; symbolic citizenship

Author Biography

Paulo Sérgio Costa Neves, Universidade Federal deSergipe

Possui graduação em Ciências Sociais pela Universidade Federal da Bahia (1989), mestrado em Sociologia e Ciências Humanas - Universite Lumiere Lyon 2 (1992) e doutorado em Sociologia e Ciências Sociais - Universite Lumiere Lyon 2 (1999). Realizou também estágios de pos-doutoramento na École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) de Paris em 2003-2004 e em 2006. Atualmente é professor associado da Universidade Federal de Sergipe. Tem experiência na área de Sociologia, com ênfase em Sociologia Política, atuando principalmente nos seguintes temas: direitos humanos, cidadania, segurança pública, relações raciais e movimentos sociais.

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Published

2007-08-01

Issue

Vol. 6 No. 11 (2007)

Section

Special Issue 1 - Sociology and sociologists in Latin America: research, teaching, and interdisciplinarity in contemporary context

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