Anti-racist and Anti-sexist Education as a Curricular Project within Race and Gender Educational Pathways in the Federal District
Curriculum Policy; Upper Secondary Education; Education for Ethnic-Racial Relations; Gender Relations
Over the past ten years, the upper secondary curriculum in Brazil has undergone significant reconfigurations, while educational dimensions related to human rights have faced resistance regarding their inclusion in the curriculum. Situated within this context, this study takes the Federal District as its empirical context and examines the curricular proposals of the formative itineraries Enegre-Ser: Minha Raiz tem Poder! ("Being Black: My Roots Have Power!") and Mulher: Protagonista da História ("Woman: Protagonist of History"). These itineraries were developed between October 2022 and January 2023 by a working group established by the Secretariat of Education of the Federal District (SEEDF) and constitute part of the flexible component of the public upper secondary school curriculum. The study analyzes the advances and limitations of the curricular proposals of the Enegre-Ser and Mulher formative itineraries for building anti-racist and anti-sexist education. Its theoretical framework brings together South American and Caribbean perspectives critical of coloniality, intersectional Black feminism, and non-hegemonic epistemological approaches, in dialogue with critical and post-critical curriculum theories. This documentary research examines the curriculum documents of the Enegre-Ser and Mulher itineraries. Data were analyzed through content analysis. Although these itineraries represent advances by making discussions that previously occupied a secondary position in curriculum policy central and systematic within the architecture of upper secondary education, they are characterized by the superficial and asymmetrical incorporation of intersectional perspectives and critiques of coloniality. As a result, the absence of intersectionality as a cross-cutting methodological axis, combined with a superficial engagement with Black feminist epistemologies, results in the invisibilization of Black women in both itineraries — in terms of their theoretical contributions as well as the specific issues affecting them. As a technical product, this study proposes a Reference Matrix for Anti-Racist and Anti-Sexist Pedagogical Planning. The matrix articulates criteria for pedagogical coherence alongside criteria grounded in intersectionality, epistemic justice, and curriculum decolonization, and is designed to support teachers in implementing these formative itineraries and to inform institutional curriculum development processes.