Being a woman and a teacher: conflicting power relations in classroom interaction

Resumo

In this paper, an analysis is made of the sequences of an interactional text, produced in a classroom event, considering the power relations related to the meanings that are socially constituted in discourse. Such an analysis is carried out under a Bakhtinian theoretical perspective, together with the ethnographic approach and the critical discourse analysis approach. According to this perspective, I consider discourse as dialectically inscribed in events of social life, i.e., producing and being produced by social interactions, which take place in the dynamic process of life. The present analysis highlights the points of tension and conflict emerging in the interaction as a result of issues like unequal power relations and of the social representation of a female teacher as a low powered subject in the Brazilian socio-cultural context.