Suchergebnisse

Nesse artigo, examino uma prática local - a circulação de crianças em bairros populares de uma grande cidade brasileira - à luz do contexto mais amplo que inclui a adoção nacional e internacional. Inicio com a descrição etnográfica de redes de ajuda mútua e valores familiares de duas mulheres que, por causa de extrema miséria, confiaram seus filhos aos cuidados de outrem. Procuro entender como essas mulheres significam a "circulação" de suas crianças e, num segundo momento, pergunto se, no seu entendimento, as leis regendo a adoção legal seriam inteligíveis. Finalmente, teço uma curta reflexão sobre discursos encontrados entre europeus e norte-americanos que recorrem à adoção, questionando a aplicação diferencial desses discursos no âmbito internacional.

PurposeTo consider transnational aspects linked to the social production of adoptable children in a Brazilian setting.Design/methodology/approachLooks at legislation and media reports, giving particular attention to how, during the 1990s, vigorous campaigns in favor of plenary adoption by Brazilian nationals implied the near‐total silencing of alternative forms of childcare such as foster care, and how recent circumstances are reversing this trend.FindingsArgues that an apparently straightforward conflict between poverty‐stricken families and the state authorities that strip them of parental rights is in fact a highly political issue involving innumerous overseas as well as national influences. National childcare policies that encourage certain childcare options and eliminate others emerge as much from scandals in the media, "consumer demands" by adoptive parents, and philanthropic support as from the more apparent global trends in child welfare legislation.Research limitations/implicationsThe findings challenge the view that childcare is a consensual issue with all fronts working for the "child's best interest". Rather, in this paper, the issue is revealed as a political matter of conflicting interests between unequal categories of caretakers.Practical implicationsThis paper has direct relevance for international legislation on child adoption policy.Originality/valueThis paper furnishes a "view from below" on international adoption, putting in question principles that are normally accepted as obvious in international legislation on child rights.

Atualmente, no Brasil, existe uma onda de testes de paternidade DNA (nos laboratórios públicos e em clínicas particulares) que levanta reflexões interessantes quanto à interseção das esferas médica e jurídica e sua influência sobre as relações de gênero e de parentesco na sociedade contemporânea. Para analisar esse fenômeno, acompanhamos nas diferentes instâncias jurídicas em Porto Alegre (na Defensoria da República, nas Audiências de Conciliação, na Vara de Família e no Serviço Médico do Tribunal) pessoas envolvidas em disputas jurídicas em torno da identidade paterna. Investigamos também como recentes mudanças nas leis de reconhecimento paterno são acionadas pelas diferentes personagens do cenário. A partir desses dados, levantamos a hipótese de que, longe de inspirar maior tranqüilidade, a simples existência do teste atiça as dúvidas. Tendo repercussões profundas sobre a nossa maneira de 'saber' quem é pai, a situação descrita nesse paper traz novos desafios para uma antropologia do conhecimento, voltada para a análise das crenças (inclusive científicas) ocidentais.

During the 1990s there was a dramatic fall in intercountry adoptions of Brazilian children — from over 2,000 per annum at the beginning of the decade to under 400 at the decade's close. On the basis of documentary material, Claudia Fonseca outlines possible reasons for this drop, considering hypotheses linked to the international market of adoptable children, legal restrictions on intercountry adoption imposed by the Brazilian government, and, finally, scandals in the mass media which stigmatise local intermediaries and officials involved in this activity.

This paper, centered on adoption policy in Brazil, asks to what extent the open–ended principles apparent in international child rights accords, filtered down through different national laws, adjust to local realities. Ethnographic data on child circulation practices in urban favelas is compared with specific clauses in the 1990 Brazilian Children's Code, as well as with adoption policies in North America, to question the code's way of legislating which children can be placed for adoption, on what terms they should be placed, and who has the power to place them.

In this essay on working-class families in a Brazilian, urban neighborhood, it is considered how, through jokes and gossip about sexual transgressions, men and women use and are affected by culturally accepted definitions of masculinity. Focusing on spontaneous speech events and placing the husband-wife relationship within a social context in which mothers and sisters exert an enormous influence over their male relatives, new dimensions of male-female power relations are glimpsed that might be overlooked by methodologies more centered on hegemonic norms. The observations suggest that particular economic and political circumstances have contributed to a situation in which images of masculine honor, although ostensibly reinforcing male privileges, are wielded by women as effective weapons against their husbands as well as against female rivals.

Claudia FONSECA, Professeur d'Anthropologie Sociale à l'Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul de Porte Alegre, Brésil, a réalisé en 1990, avec le soutien du Bureau de la Maternité du Ministère des Affaires sociales et de la Solidarité, une recherche ethnologique dans le service de maternité du Centre hospitalier d'une grande ville de l'Ouest de la France. Nous publions ici des extraits de son rapport (Quelques réflexions ethnologiques sur une maternité française, Ethnos, 1991) : elle y traite de la confrontation des pratiques et représentations de mères d'origines sociales et culturelles différentes avec celles des personnels hospitaliers.