by Larissa Jacheta Riberti “When education is not liberatory, the dream of the oppressed is to be the oppressor” This quote is from Paulo Freire, one of the most renowned and frequently cited educational theorists in the World. The works he produced during the 20th Century conceived of education as a means to transform people, […]
Brasil’s Education crisis is not a crisis, it is a project. – Darcy Ribeiro. Across the political spectrum Brazilians will tell you that the principal problem in the country is education, yet who profits most from programmed, weaponised ignorance? Research, science, technology, culture, and education are not ideologies, but approaches and attitudes toward them in […]
Two manifestos circulated by North American and European Professors, Intellectuals and Students in support of their Brazilian counterparts, who face a wave of intimidation unseen since the Military Dictatorship of 1964-1985. Those working and studying in Brazilian Universities have our unequivocal solidarity – Editors. Manifesto by North American Professors We, intellectuals, professors, students and directors of academic institutions, proclaim our perplexity […]
By Tiago Rodrigues Santos Since 1984, the MST (Movimento Sem Terra or Landless Rural Workers’ Movement) has voluntarily built 1500 public schools in its agrarian reform settlement villages in the Brasilian countryside. One highlight of this long process was the construction of its Florestan Fernandes National school, which contains a working organic farm and, through […]
On October 10, non-elected Brazilian president and former military dictatorship official Michel Temer held a $30,000, publicly funded banquet for his allies in the lower house. The event commemorated the launching of a constitutional amendment called PEC 241- referred to as the “End of the World Amendment” by its critics- an enforced Austerity plan which […]
The State Government of São Paulo’s planned closure of almost 100 schools provoked a campaign of resistance from pupils in the form of occupations and street mobilisations. This film is their protest in their own words.
Exclusive Brasil Wire video on the Student Protests. TV Folha’s video which was pulled from air. In Brazil’s richest state, Governor orders military police to attack teenagers for protesting school closures. I am in São Paulo’s booming Pinheiros district, watching police cars circle around Fernão Dias Paes school. A group of nervous looking teenagers sit […]
In the new Brazilian movie, “Que Horas ela Volta?” Regina Casé plays a North-Eastern kitchen maid for a rich woman in São Paulo. The narrative is based on the tension created when her employer discovers that her maid’s daughter has been accepted to a prestigious public university. Although neither Casé nor her daughter are black […]