Tracing feminism in Brazil

Women's movements and feminisms in Brazil have taken various forms throughout the years, contributing significantly to socio-political actions that favor gender justice. However, Brazilian feminisms remain on the margins of American academic discourse. In the United States, conceptualizations of feminism are often complicated by epistemological practices that treat certain political actions as feminist while dismissing others. The invisibility of Brazilian feminisms within feminist scholarship in the United States, therefore, justifies the need for further research on the topic. My research focuses on feminist articles published by Revista Estudos Feministas, one of the oldest and most well known feminist journals in Brazil. Using postcolonial, postmodern, and critical race feminist theories as a framework of analysis, my thesis investigates the theories and works utilized by feminists in Brazil. I argue that Brazilian feminisms both challenge and emulate the social, economic, and geopolitical orders that divide the world into Global North and South.