Gender and Adoption in the Brazilian Context: An Integrative Review of the Scientific Literature

Abstract

The present study aimed to understand how the gender category emerges in studies about adoption in the Brazilian context. The guiding question was: How do researches in the context of adoption, regarding children, parents and professionals, address gender issues? An integrative literature review was conducted on the databases LILACS, SciELO and PePISC with the descriptors adoption, gender and parentality, published between 2007 and 2017. Seventeen articles had been recovered and three categories were constituted: (a) Exercise of maternity in the context of adoption; (b) (In)visibility of paternity in the discussion about adoptive parenting; (c) Homoparentality: meanings of reproductive technology and adoption. The studies brought to light refl ections about adoptive parenting and adoptive homoparentality, as well as highlighting the way these couples exercise their parental roles. It is concluded that understanding how parental roles are exercised in these diff erent realities makes it possible to understand diff erent family arrangements, opening more space for families by adoption. It is recommended to expand the gender discussions in order to provide questions and tensions for this scenario, dialoguing with diff erent developmental and clinical perspectives.