Relações raciais e histórias de vida: trabalhadores industriais negros em foco

Abstract

The construction of black identities in Brazil is marked by several struggles that directly influence recent institutional advances in this subject and contribute to the deconstruction of the racial democracy myth. This paper analyzes how elements related to racial relations are presented in the life stories of black industrial workers. For such, we discuss elements constitutive of the construction of black identities in Brazil, as well as the idea of racial democracy. By using the inductive method, data collection based on life stories was performed and treated by structuralist discourse analysis, especially concerning social-historic elements present in their discourse. The main data present racial relations in Leila and Clovis’ stories, our research subjects, hers being a story of a political position regarding miscegenation and his the story of a racism victim. The main conclusions suggest that even with institutional advances of the black movement in Brazil, consciousness about self-blackness is the first step for black people to effectively occupy any place they want in society.