A Feminist Student Movement: Facing Institutionalized Sexism at the University of São Paulo in São Carlos, Brazil

Universities transnationally have tried to minimize reports by female students of sexual abuse on campus. In 2014, the Canadian media uncovered a Facebook group formed by students of the Dalhousie University where sexist content was regularly posted. A report on the case argued that: the situation was not unique to the university, the faculty’s culture facilitated the events, and a systematic change was needed to respond to complaints. Academic research is needed to understand the socio-cultural and political reasons of the ineffective treatment of complaints, the mechanisms used to hide institutional sexism, and the institutions’ culture that facilitates the acts. In my master’s thesis, I propose to address these questions through an ethnographic study of the management of sexism at the University of São Paulo in São Carlos, Brazil. In 2009, a group of students formed a group to protest against a contest where new female students modelled and stripped. Today, feminists and victims reporting sexual abuses are harassed by other students and their complaints are dismissed by the university. TO BE CONT’D

Faculty Supervisor:

Sally Cole

Student:

Partner:

Universidade Federal de São Carlos

Discipline:

Sociology

Sector:

Education

University:

Concordia University

Program: