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Grupos de Estudos Feministas em Espaços Universitários e as Insurgentes Tessituras na Descolonização da Psicologia - Feminist Study Groups in University Settings and Insurgent Weavings in the Decolonization of Psychology
Bárbara Araújo Sordi
Affiliation: Federal University of Pará & University of Amazonia, Belém, Brazil
Keywords: Psychology; Feminism; Groups; Decoloniality; Amazon.
Categories: Humanities, Social Sciences and Law, Demetrios Project
DOI: 10.17160/josha.12.5.1075
Languages: Portuguese
This thesis aimed to investigate the experience of feminist study groups in the academic environment as a device for promoting Countercolonial Feminist Psychology. Based on the experience of a group that lasted five years, with weekly meetings involving readings, group dynamics, sharing of personal experiences, and monthly community actions, the study sought to examine participants’ perceptions regarding the effects of the meetings on self-image and social relationships, as well as their perceptions of the Psychology program and its impact on their theoretical-political understanding and clinical and institutional practices. Assuming a countercolonial problematization in relation to the coloniality of being-knowing-power and the concept of gender coloniality within Psychology, and drawing on reflections from Black, Latin American, Indigenous, and decolonial feminist authors, the research methodology was cartography. This approach was chosen for its attention to the subjectivity of both the researcher and participants, and for its inseparability of research and action, producing data through field journals, dialogue circles, and interviews with five participants. Results indicated that the group functioned as a device for the decolonization of body and affect. Participants began to decolonize the hegemonic white colonial mirror by recognizing themselves as political, Black and White bodies, thereby evidencing racism and whiteness, and reflecting on the impacts of miscegenation on mental health and social relationships, particularly in the Amazonian and riverside region. Participants also decolonized the colonial gender matrix by identifying and re-signifying asymmetrical and violent relational processes, including silencing, psychological violence linked to female disqualification, pressures from European beauty standards (thinness, whiteness), compulsory heterosexuality, and demands for female performativity associated with passivity and modesty, with symptoms affecting relationships with food and sexual pleasure. The study also identified the presence of a loving device, showing changes in emotions, social positions, and relationships with self and others, with effects that contributed to interrupting domestic violence among family members. The group provided exchanges that revealed sexual violence, including child sexual abuse and other previously repressed or unspoken experiences, creating a safe, testimonial space. Regarding Psychology, participants demonstrated decolonization of universalizing concepts, increased political commitment, and critical understanding of gender coloniality and subjectivity, with tensions around diagnostic interpretations, symptoms, disorders, therapeutic approaches, theoretical understandings, and scientific production. Thus, the thesis highlights the importance of recognizing Psychology as a political device and space of power, requiring reforms in being and practice that consider gender coloniality and promote the decolonization of imported traditional practices. Feminist and gender study groups enable re-significations for Psychology as both a science and a profession, while also transforming the lives of participants, fostering a renewed cultivation of affective life aligned with well-being. This underscores the importance of courses and groups that adopt these propositions in Psychology education, demonstrating the effectiveness of such practices in self-redefinition and their impact on professional practices committed to social reality and human rights.