Author: Alan Alves-Brito
Affiliation: Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul
Country: Brazil
Title: Astronomy education and communication in the Brazilian society: inclusion, diversity, equity and empathy in the 21st Century
Brazil is Latin America’s largest country and one of the most populous countries in the
world, with approximately 210 million people. For more than 350 years, the country was
the focus of a strong slavery system. South America’s most influential country, Brazil
presents a strong economic power. However, throughout its history, Brazil has been a
country with a high level of inequality. One of the greatest challenges of its basic
education system as well as its Astronomy communication and popularization platform
in the 21st Century is, from one side, the implementation of Laws 10.639/03 and
11.645/08, which make compulsory to include the teaching of History of Africa,
Afro-Brazilian and Indigenous Culture in the curricula of Brazil’s educational institutions
and, from the other side, the attraction of women and other underrepresented groups to
Astronomy in the fighting for a more egalitarian society. I will show and discuss in this
work how some of our projects in Brazil, focused on astronomy education and
communication, are changing our local reality by promoting the intersection of gender,
race, ethnicity, generation and class in the Astronomy field.
References
[1]: Alves-Brito, A., Bootz, V, Massoni, N. 2018. Uma sequência didática para
discutir as relações étnico-raciais (Leis 10.639/03 e 11.645/08) na educação científica.
Caderno Brasileiro de Ensino de Física. v. 35, n. 3, p. 917-955
[2]: FERNANDES, E; CINEL, N. C. L. B.; LOPES, V. N. Da África aos
indígenas do Brasil: caminhos para o estudo de História e Cultura Afro-brasileira e
Indígena. 1. ed. Porto Alegre: UFRGS, 2016.
[3]: ROSA, K. Science identity possibilities: a look into Blackness,
masculinities, and economic power relations. Cultural Studies of Science Education,
2018a.