As culturas indígenas e a gestão das escolas da Comunidade Guariba, RR: uma etnografia

Abstract

This study is focused on the themes of Indigenous Peoples’ Cultures and School Management. It presents an ethnographic drawing whose collection of evidence was built on semi-structured interviews, census, observation, document analysis, maps, pictures, and special regards to field diaries. The main objective of this thesis is to understand the interactions between indigenous cultures and the processes of management adopted by the schools of the Indigenous Guariba Community, in the municipality of Amajari, Roraima. The research corpus is build upon: a study of the Education for Indigenous People in Brazil and in the State of Roraima (considering both regular and indigenous school management) as supported by legislation; a contextualization of the empirical field, with a description of the people of Roraima, their place and traditions; and a study of intercultural dialogues and cultural diversity. Internal and external elements that interfere on the subject, as well as formal and informal aspects that configure the daily life of the management of these schools were considered in this research. Content analysis was used (BARDIN, 1977 & 2011), and the theoretical framework was based on the Complexity Theory (MORIN, 1991, 1996, 1997, 2009 & 2011). The indigenous community that constituted the empirical field of research includes the ethnic groups Wapixana and Makuxi. Their schools are linked to the Municipal and to the State Boards of Education. The process of analysis I used as well as my long term staying in the region allow me to confirm that there is a mutual dialogue between indigenous cultures and the methodsof schools management in the Guariba Community. Some of the conclusions Ihave reached in this study are: the local indigenous culture is used as a mediator in the interaction between community and school lives; today, the Indigenous Community of Guariba uses of the school in order to reaffirm and maintain their local cultural activities; the interactions and inter-relations can be perceived in different and diverse situations (or actions) that happen in the schools and in the community, as widely described in this dissertation; and the local indigenous activities are inherent in the way the school is managed.