Conceituação e hierarquização das questões de gênero em tesauros: um estudo ancorado na organização social e crítica do conhecimento em diálogo com a interseccionalidade e a decolonialidade

Abstract

Based on the understanding that gender is a social construct and can be viewed as a system of social categorization, the research aimed to address the following problem question: How can gender studies contribute to highlighting the ways in which gender is treated, conceptualized, and hierarchized by Knowledge Organization Systems focused on language representation? From this, the general objective was established: to analyze how the term "gender" is conceptualized and hierarchized in specialized thesauri on gender issues through the theoretical lens of Knowledge Organization and Gender Studies. The specific objectives of the research were: a) to contextualize gender as a social categorization, beyond binarity and heteronormativity, and as hegemonic structures; b) to categorize the definitions and relationships of the term "gender" in specialized gender thesauri; c) to analyze whether the definitions and relationships of the term "gender" presented in the thesauri converge with the understanding of gender from the perspectives of Decoloniality and Intersectionality; and d) to develop a small glossary, offering a conceptual update of each gender-related concept studied in this research. To delimit the object, six thesauri relevant to the theme of gender were selected: Thesaurus for Gender Studies and Women (Brazil); Thesaurus on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (Brazil); Thesaurus of Gender: Language with Equity (Mexico); Homossaurus Thesaurus (produced by researchers from different regions, but with significant input from the United States and the Netherlands); Women Thesaurus (Netherlands); and Family Thesaurus (Australia). By focusing the investigation on gender studies, the research acknowledges the multidimensional nature of the field, given the plurality of themes involving gender. Thus, the research is characterized as qualitative, bibliographic, descriptive, and exploratory. Consistent with this framework, content analysis was used as it allows for a systematic investigation of the content of various types of communication involving processes of coding, categorization, and analysis. Based on this, the theoretical lenses of Decoloniality and Intersectionality were employed for the interpretive analysis of the conceptualization and hierarchization of "gender" in specialized thesauri on the subject, modeling the following methodological design for execution: establishing a theoretical referential focused on gender studies and aligned with the perspectives of intersectionality and decoloniality; creating a theoretical referential centered on Knowledge Organization, specifically on the development and characterization of Thesauri; presenting a re-reading of the dimensions of Social and Critical Knowledge Organization; systematizing the collected material and performing content analysis on the sample; developing analysis categories – Conceptualization and Hierarchization – of the results from the theoretical lenses of knowledge organization and gender studies through the perspective of intersectionality and decoloniality; and finally, proposing a broad and simplified conceptualization of the terms. The results showed that the investigated thesauri partially include an intersectional perspective in the conceptualization and hierarchization of terms, and that the critique formulated from a decolonial perspective is still incipient in these instruments, thus requiring an update or the creation of new thesauri based on these theoretical-critical perspectives.