Curriculum Studies in Brazil: An Overview

Abstract

This article provides an overview of the nature of curriculum studies in Brazil. The evolution of Brazilian curriculum field can be roughly divided into three phases: Pre-Marxist (1950s-1970s); Marxist (1980s-mid 1990s); and Post-Marxist (mid 1990s-present). The pre-Marxist phase of curriculum thinking in Brazil was dominated by a Tylerian instrumentalism. The Marxist phase focused on school-society relationship employing concepts like power, ideology, hegemony, and reproduction. Marxism dominated the Brazilian field until the middle of 1990s when postmodern, poststructural and postcolonial discourses–which emphasized subjectivity, everyday life, hybridity, and multiculturalism–replaced Marxist curriculum thinking.

William F. Pinar, Curriculum Studies in Brazil, published 2011, reproduced with permission of Palgrave Macmillan.