Cecilia McCallum

Aproximacoes socioantropologicas sobre a gravidez na adolescencia

This paper aims to discuss the construction of teenage pregnancy as a social problem. It also seeks to present and analyze the data of the qualitative phase of the research study Teenage Pregnancy: A Multicentric Study of Young People, Sexuality and Reproduction in Brazil (GRAVAD study) undertaken in four Brazilian capitals: Porto Alegre, Rio de Janeiro and Salvador. The data indicate the indissoluble character of the articulation between social class and gender in the understanding of the phenomenon of teenage pregnancy. Among girls from the middle class we observe alterations in their management of their school projects and course, which, until that point, were processed in a linear manner. The same does not occur among girls from lower income groups whose irregularity in school life is independent of motherhood. Among the young men there are no significant changes, since middle class boys not interrupt their school projects or courses, and boys from lower income groups enter the work force precociously, and this is not a direct consequence of teenage fatherhood.

Women out of Place? A Micro-historical Perspective on the Black Feminist Movement in Salvador da Bahia, Brazil

In Brazil, black women are symbolically and practically associated with domestic work. The article examines feminist responses to black womens place in the socio-economic hierarchy of the city of Salvador, Bahia. These include proposals to introduce affirmative action and a ‘politics of presence’, involving the election of black women to represent the citys black female constituency. It describes the racial dynamics at work between black and white feminists in Bahia, signalling the contradictory tendencies that structure their relationship. Arguing against the view that a ‘politics of identity’ necessarily supports a new essentialism of race or culture, the article describes the diverse ideological and political influences upon the ideas and proposals of Bahian feminists. Black feminists construct racial difference as experiential and structural in origin. They adapt academic concepts and language in order to discuss their own lives and the specific social and cultural context of Salvador. The ethnographic and micro-historical perspective adopted here provides insight into ‘native’ understandings of affirmative action and a ‘politics of presence’ and suggests that criticisms of these measures on the grounds that they represent imported, non-Brazilian views of race are misplaced.

Childbirth as ritual in Brazil: young mothers' experiences

Abstract The article examines childbirth in a public hospital in Salvador, Brazil, as a multidimensional, embodied process and as a rite of passage. The birth narratives of young, poor, black mothers are seen through ethnography of the obstetric centre, run by white, middle-class obstetricians. The article follows the biosocial process of birth, tracing the development and mutation of loneliness, fear, and pain into motherlove. This subjective journey is generated within the social interactions constituting the physiological birth events. Primiparous women are shown to construct the birth as a rite of passage into legitimate motherhood, in the face of a hegemonic symbolic frame that stigmatizes youthful motherhood and delegitimizes reproduction amongst young, black, low-income women. Hospital childbirths most powerful social effect is the constitution and consecration of a race/class divide.

Representações sociais de Agentes Comunitários de Saúde acerca do consumo de drogas

This paper discusses on the social representations of community health agents (CHAs) about drug use as part of a qualitative, ethnographic study with data collected by means of a set of research techniques among health professionals including 22 CHAs in a basic health unit in Salvador, Bahia (Brazil) from January, 2006 to January, 2007. The Theory of Social Representations was adopted as the theoretical framework whereas gender was the chosen analytical category. CHAs were found to recognize the womens proximity and participation in the drug phenomenon in the community where they live and act, although they take no professional measures towards such an issue. Their social representations were shown to reproduce stereotypes and prejudices towards drug users and drug use, especially gender- and social class-related, while highlighting the invisibility of drug use as a health problem for the population under study.This paper discusses on the social representations of community health agents (CHAs) about drug use as part of a qualitative, ethnographic study with data collected by means of a set of research techniques among health professionals including 22 CHAs in a basic health unit in Salvador, Bahia (Brazil) from January, 2006 to January, 2007. The Theory of Social Representations was adopted as the theoretical framework whereas gender was the chosen analytical category. CHAs were found to recognize the womens proximity and participation in the drug phenomenon in the community where they live and act, although they take no professional measures towards such an issue. Their social representations were shown to reproduce stereotypes and prejudices towards drug users and drug use, especially gender- and social class-related, while highlighting the invisibility of drug use as a health problem for the population under study.

Users' and providers' perspectives on technological procedures for 'normal' childbirth in a public maternity hospital in Salvador, Brazil

OBJECTIVE To reveal the effect of cultural practices on the way in which normal birth is conducted in a public hospital in Brazil. MATERIAL AND METHODS This article about a public maternity hospital in Salvador, Brazil, compares the points of view of providers and users on four technological normal childbirth procedures: trichotomy, episiotomy, oxytocin infusion, and epidural analgesia. Fieldwork carried out from 2002 to 2003 combined qualitative and quantitative methods. RESULTS Institutional practices make childbirth unnecessarily difficult for women. Nonetheless, most women accept the conditions because the medical procedures make sense according to their cultural understandings. Service providers support the use of such procedures, although doctors are aware that they contradict recommendations found in scientific medical literature. This article argues that from the perspective of both providers and users, the technological procedures are infused with a culturally specific set of meanings and values. CONCLUSIONS Policymakers must address the cultural understandings of both users and health care professionals in order to improve maternal healthcare in public hospitals in Brazil.

O cuidado de grávidas e bebês no contexto do Programa de Saúde da Família: um estudo etnográfico

This study contributes to the conceptual discussion of healthcare, seen through an ethnographic approach to the care of pregnant women and newborns offered by health professionals working under the Family Health Program in a low-income neighborhood of Salvador, Brazil. Research involved Interviews and participant observation. In the article we analyze and compare professionals’ and user’s perspectives in two disti nct contexts: The discovery of pregnancy and the decision to take it to completion; and attitudes an d practices with respect to breast-feeding. We argue that, for both, care involves a permanent con struction of “projects of the person”. While professionals focus their interventions on women, s eeking to implement guidelines and planned routines, users of the health centre resort to spon taneous behavior that attends to practical demands in which several relatives participate and where em bodied experience is central. Differences between professionals and users are linked not only with subjective characters but with the social positions that they occupy.Este trabalho pretende contribuir para a discussao conceitual sobre o cuidado a partir de uma abordagem etnografica com gravidas e bebes em um bairro popular de Salvador atendido pelo Programa de Saude da Familia. Realizamos entrevistas e observacao participante. Com base na analise de duas situacoes - a descoberta da gravidez com a decisao de leva-la adiante e o aleitamento - comparamos a perspectiva dos profissionais com a dos usuarios. Argumentamos que, para ambos, o cuidado envolve a construcao permanente de projetos de pessoa. Enquanto os profissionais centram suas intervencoes nas mulheres, buscando dar orientacoes e aplicar rotinas planejadas, os usuarios fazem referencia a comportamentos espontâneos que respondem a demandas praticas e onde a corporalidade da experiencia e central. As diferencas entre profissionais e usuarios sao relacionadas nao apenas com caracteristicas subjetivas, mas com as posicoes sociais que ocupam.

Cuidado infantil na relação entre adultos e crianças na periferia de salvador

We conducted an ethnographic study on the construction of child care in everyday family living in a poor neighborhood of Salvador, seeking to integrate concerns of psychology with the anthropological discussion about person. We used participant observation and interviews. Taking as starting point the reflections of Ayres, we argue that care involves ongoing construction of projects of person in a framework of power relations. The research results identified the centrality of the daily work with the body to achieve the goal of having an educated and nature dominated child, and these concerns are central to the construction of the person. We advocate the importance of thinking in the social construction of the person - including contributions from anthropological research - to build a research agenda in psychology that addresses cultural diversity.

Social representations of community health agents regarding drug use

This paper discusses on the social representations of community health agents (CHAs) about drug use as part of a qualitative, ethnographic study with data collected by means of a set of research techniques among health professionals including 22 CHAs in a basic health unit in Salvador, Bahia (Brazil) from January, 2006 to January, 2007. The Theory of Social Representations was adopted as the theoretical framework whereas gender was the chosen analytical category. CHAs were found to recognize the womens proximity and participation in the drug phenomenon in the community where they live and act, although they take no professional measures towards such an issue. Their social representations were shown to reproduce stereotypes and prejudices towards drug users and drug use, especially gender- and social class-related, while highlighting the invisibility of drug use as a health problem for the population under study.This paper discusses on the social representations of community health agents (CHAs) about drug use as part of a qualitative, ethnographic study with data collected by means of a set of research techniques among health professionals including 22 CHAs in a basic health unit in Salvador, Bahia (Brazil) from January, 2006 to January, 2007. The Theory of Social Representations was adopted as the theoretical framework whereas gender was the chosen analytical category. CHAs were found to recognize the womens proximity and participation in the drug phenomenon in the community where they live and act, although they take no professional measures towards such an issue. Their social representations were shown to reproduce stereotypes and prejudices towards drug users and drug use, especially gender- and social class-related, while highlighting the invisibility of drug use as a health problem for the population under study.

Cuidado e construção social da pessoa: contribuições para uma teoria geral

O presente trabalho tem como objetivo realizar uma reflexao conceitual sobre o cuidado. Apos desenvolver uma revisao da literatura, que se detem especialmente no trabalho de Ayres, defende-se a necessidade de pensar duas grandes maneiras de compreender o cuidado na area da saude: de um lado, o cuidado constitui um horizonte normativo que orienta as praticas de saude; de outro, tal como e mostrado com dados etnograficos, cuidado envolve a construcao cotidiana de projetos de pessoa que se da em um marco de relacoes de poder. O primeiro e um conceito inspirador para a construcao de boas praticas de saude. O conceito aqui proposto nos aproxima do cotidiano, de praticas de cuidado construidas por pessoas nos mais diversos contextos. Ambos os conceitos estao ligados a perspectiva ontologica do Cuidado e sao fundamentais para a construcao de uma teoria geral sobre o cuidado.

Caring for pregnant women and babies in the context of the Family Healthcare Program: an ethnographic study

This study contributes to the conceptual discussion of healthcare, seen through an ethnographic approach to the care of pregnant women and newborns offered by health professionals working under the Family Health Program in a low-income neighborhood of Salvador, Brazil. Research involved Interviews and participant observation. In the article we analyze and compare professionals’ and user’s perspectives in two disti nct contexts: The discovery of pregnancy and the decision to take it to completion; and attitudes an d practices with respect to breast-feeding. We argue that, for both, care involves a permanent con struction of “projects of the person”. While professionals focus their interventions on women, s eeking to implement guidelines and planned routines, users of the health centre resort to spon taneous behavior that attends to practical demands in which several relatives participate and where em bodied experience is central. Differences between professionals and users are linked not only with subjective characters but with the social positions that they occupy.Este trabalho pretende contribuir para a discussao conceitual sobre o cuidado a partir de uma abordagem etnografica com gravidas e bebes em um bairro popular de Salvador atendido pelo Programa de Saude da Familia. Realizamos entrevistas e observacao participante. Com base na analise de duas situacoes - a descoberta da gravidez com a decisao de leva-la adiante e o aleitamento - comparamos a perspectiva dos profissionais com a dos usuarios. Argumentamos que, para ambos, o cuidado envolve a construcao permanente de projetos de pessoa. Enquanto os profissionais centram suas intervencoes nas mulheres, buscando dar orientacoes e aplicar rotinas planejadas, os usuarios fazem referencia a comportamentos espontâneos que respondem a demandas praticas e onde a corporalidade da experiencia e central. As diferencas entre profissionais e usuarios sao relacionadas nao apenas com caracteristicas subjetivas, mas com as posicoes sociais que ocupam.