“Talking About Gender” at Schools: Potentials of an Intervention with Children

Abstract

This paper presents an intervention performed with public school first-graders which approached gender equality and girls’ and women’s empowerment, in order to fight violence against the ones who do not fit into the socially demanded naturalized gender discourses. As a tool to approach such themes, we used children’s books, and we performed interactive-reflective activities in a range of ten meetings. We analyzed data with the help of Discourse Analysis. We conclude that, by offering spaces to debate and to criticize naturalized speeches in the researched classroom setting, children are able to reflect about inequalities still thrusted on boys/men and on girls/women, and construct alternatives to fight gender inequalities in society. Therefore, we understand that the intervention we performed may be embraced by teachers and other professionals who intend to raise awareness about fighting the exclusion and the violence caused by gender inequality, to encourage the existence of (more) spaces for similar activities, and to spread the potential of such debates.