TRACINGS FATES? GENDER, RACE, PRECARIOUSNESS AND RESISTANCE BETWEEN THE SCHOOL COOKS IN RIO DE JANEIRO

Abstract

This article is the result of a research that investigated the relationships between gender, race and job insecurity in a Pedro II School cocks ladies group in Rio de Janeiro. Starting from the fact that the cooks are a group largely made up of black women living in the periphery, the study sought to examine the relationship between the social trajectory of the interviewees and their employability. The finding was that there is a direct link between the fact of being female and black, the exercise of cooks profession and conditions of precariousness, experienced daily in the workplace. The survey results allow us to conclude that even after advances in relation of gender and race in the past decades, there are sectors of Brazilian society where the choices and career paths are still determined by social structures. This is a clear evidence of the permanence of conditions subordination of black women. On the other hand, it is possible to identify in interviews resistance elements to precarious work and history of race discrimination process and gender that they were submitted since childhood. This is revealed in the fight against the working conditions and strenghtening of their identities as black women.