Non-formal education and scientific-cultural spaces in Brazil: a historical-dialectic materialism perspective

Abstract

In this work we bring and discuss historical-cultural subsidies for the construction process of the non-formal education around the world and in Brazil, having the historical-dialectic materialism as our method and theoretical lens and aiming at a deeper understanding of this social phenomenon. Our analytical course starts at the broadest context possible, the western one, identifying the major factors that corroborated for the emergence of non-formal education, such as: education crisis, reconstruction of the nations during the postwar and Cold War periods. From this background, we narrow down the analysis, passing through the Latin American and Brazilian scenarios, recognizing oppression movements inside the non-formal education on the part of the hegemonic class as well as resistance movements on the part of the oppressed, revealing the contradictory and dialectic aspect of this human activity. In the end, we present an overview of the distribution and access of the cultural and scientific-cultural spaces in Brazil, aiming at comprehend how the history and the contradictions of the constitution process of the Brazilian non formal education materialize nowadays, exposing the unequal distribution and access of these cultural facilities, as they are concentrated in the Southeast states and visited more by the rich and more educated population.