A critical discourse analysis of gender relations in Brazil

Abstract

Gender relations in Brazil are focused in this paper from the perspective of language, as seen in presuppositions and commonsense assumptions. Presuppositions, viewed as part of the intertextual context, are analyzed to show how underlying processes of language play a significant part in reproducing unequal power relations. The analysis of three different texts shows the relation between language and ideology in the construction of gender. It is found that heterogeneity guides presuppositions and commonsense assumptions of texts about women and texts produced by women in Brazil, indicating two main forms of coexistence: the discourse of control and the discourse of liberation. Further, behind the discourse of liberation, one will register the discourse of control which derives from the dominating gender of a basically patriarchal society. In the big cities, however, the analysis shows that women have a social identity derived from the struggle for civil rights. Thus, while two of the texts are representative of the tension between the discourse of control and the discourse of liberation in this society, the third one reveals a discourse change in progress: liberated from the conservative patriarchal discourse, women demand that their rights be made explicit in the Constitution.