Produção e conservação escolar da masculinidade no romance O Ateneu

Abstract

This assay examines the production and conservation of masculinity in the novel O Ateneu (Raul Pompeia), which portrays the life in an elite boarding school on 19th Century. The assay mainly discusses about Sergio's trajectory, narrator and protagonist of the novel, which suffers disciplinary experiences to transform their infant and female brands into adult and males characteristics. The production and conservation of masculinity appear mainly involved in ritual events that aim to define identities giving socially recognized distinctive marks which acclaim the virile norm and stigmatize and punish presumed female frailties or behaviors seen as effeminate. The analysis of the production and conservation of masculinity in the O Ateneu allows us to observe the "historical mechanisms responsible for the dehistoricization and perpetuation of structures related sexual division" (Bourdieu, 2002, p. 8) active in that school surrounding.