O Serviço Ssocial do Comércio e a produção de conhecimentos sobre o lazer no Brasil (década de 1970)

Abstract

This study deals with the role of Commerce Social Service´s SESC on establishing leisure as a study field in Brazil. The usual sense of scientific knowledge production given to leisure studies was the starting point to consider the dimensions in which this field is presented, as an elaborated and organized lore, expressed by means of textual production and oriented by infinite interpretation possibilities. The research motivation was the thought of how leisure became important and a real question to different social segments during the 70´s. It proposes an investigation about SESC participation on Brazil´s leisure thinking. From the premise that leisure researches highlight the scientific actions and initiatives headed by SESC during the 70´s, comes the intention to dialogue with the sources, in order to comprehend the leisure role in the country development. The context marked by industrialization, urbanization, population growth and migration from the country to the cities, made of people´s behavior in urban centers a real matter, and raised the discussion around the need of more leisure opportunities in the cities, that end up expanding their frontiers without urban planning and away from the free zones concern. Before this scenario, what are the possible reflections of the ways SESC took to structure its leisure thinking and concepts? The following text, by means of historical investigation, looks for enhancing unique aspects of SESC role in 70´s, in terms of studies incentive and intellectual production. The methodology applied here aims to bring the historical subject voice to the knowledge building process. For that, it was necessary to get acquainted with the Institution history, in order to spot evidences able to reveal the origins of the concern and interest related to leisure. The sources founded express the institutional conditions to the leisure knowledge production in Brazil, along the period this study incurs: studies and research incentive that allowed a certain professional segment - SESC technicians from São Paulo to accumulate the suitable guidelines to fit the demand of this knowledge field in construction. And, at the same time, the promotion of scientific actions, such as seminars and congresses, that put SESC, as a social institution, in Brazil leisure history avant-garde.