Negritude por conveniência ou legitimidade? Uma análise cultural das parlamentares federais negras brasileiras

Abstract

The main objective of this dissertation is to develop a cultural analysis of the identities and representations of Black Brazilian Congresswomen. The federal parliament is composed of the Chamber of Deputies, with 513 seats, and the Federal Senate, with 81 seats, totaling 594 legislative positions. In the most recent general elections, in 2022, 540 seats were up for grabs, and only 29 Black women (13 Black and 16 Brown [mixed race]) were elected to fill them. The outcome of the electoral dispute shows that political parity between men and women is far from being achieved, and among the women holding political positions, racial equality is still distant. In parallel to this reality, considering the expansion of digital social networks and their influence on contemporary society, we chose Instagram to carry out part of our analysis, which involves the relationships established by the female lawmakers, as the social network has become particularly prominent among politicians compared to other platforms. Based on the question of how Black federal lawmakers appropriate Instagram to construct their identities, our specific objective is to understand the construction of these Black politicians' identities and representations on the platform. To conduct the proposed analysis, the methodological approach used is the theoretical-methodological protocol of mediations (Martín-Barbero, 2009), which allows us to understand the communication process built within the relationships established and the meanings produced by the lawmakers in a comprehensive way, going beyond content-based and technical interpretations. The cultural analysis from the perspective of mediations addresses the communicational process in its social, institutional, economic, and technical dimensions, observing practices empirically in the cultural context in which they are embedded. In this case, to study the production-circulation-consumption logic of Black lawmakers on Instagram, it was necessary to contextualize the historical-social-cultural process of the formation of Brazilian society, deeply marked by structural racism (Almeida, 2019) and colonial patriarchy, which led us to engage with Black feminist theorists (Carneiro, 2019; Ribeiro, 2018; Kilomba, 2020; bell hooks, 2020) and decolonial theorists (Lugones, 2014; Gonzalez, 2020). Therefore, we understand this as an analytical approach to the cultural context, aiming at the decolonization of these relations. Key analytical categories also included theoretical concepts of identity and representation (Hall, 2006; Munanga, 1990). Our qualitative research also aims to reflect on the low representation of Black women and the improper appropriation of Black identity in the National Congress, which required the collection of empirical data from both the lawmakers' Instagram pages and the institutional websites of the Chamber and Senate regarding the legislative production of female lawmakers, as well as interviews with lawmakers who agreed to discuss their trajectories, legislative work, and use of the platform, which complemented our interpretations. We found that the fight for the rights of Black women and against racism is present in the agendas predominantly defended by self-identified Black lawmakers and members of left-wing parties. In contrast, those affiliated with right-wing parties, mostly self-identified as Brown, are more conservative and serve the patriarchy. Furthermore, among the Brown lawmakers, there is a clear electoral appropriation of race. Thus, we aim to contribute to the debate on the presence and effective representation of Black women in national politics.