Women and their careers at Unicamp's Faculty of Medical Sciences: Unique voices and collective images

Abstract

This article presents a historical and social rediscovery of the trajectories of women professors at Unicamp's Faculty of Medical Sciences and of their personal and professional choices, in conjunction with their social strategies. It explores their roles and positions in the academic world, how they shaped their habitus, and how the latter related to the gender issue. The theoretical reference for the qualitative methodology employed was taken from studies of gender and of the sociology of science and health, including Merton's focused interviews and Bardin's content analysis. The women identified social representations of family, marriage, and children, the social division of work time, and the patriarchal structure of science as gender elements that influenced their careers.