The MEB AND THE MILITARY DICTATORSHIP:

(DIS)CONTINUOUS LESSONS

Abstract

This article analyzed the dialectical process of continuity and discontinuity in the activities of Movimento de Educação de Base (MEB), discussing its creation, functioning, educational practices and trajectory before and during the period of the dictatorial regime. MEB was created by Conferência Nacional de Bispos do Brasil (CNBB), in partnership with the federal government, to implement adult literacy in regions called “underdeveloped” at the time, using the radio education system. Thus, it was remembered the educational practices of the Movement in the popular effervescence of the 1960s. The following were considered as documentary sources: legislation (Presidential Decrees), letters from students and monitors and documents produced by MEB (reports, letters, radio programs and lessons from the booklet Viver é Lutar). Conceiving memory as power and a form of resistance, it was resorted, to support the discussion of these documents, studies by Freire (2005), Kadt (2007), Góes (2002) and Pollak (1992). As results, it showed MEB marks the 1960s as a big step towards adult education, as it enabled the subject/worker to go far beyond the knowledge of the word, allowing the recognition of themselves as citizens, the rights that needed to be conquered and the understanding of the role that this culture-producing subject had in the construction of society. However, MEB suffered harsh penalties to resist the dictatorship imposed by the civil-military coup, which resulted in the redefinition of its educational direction, which became more and more discontinued in the sense of silencing and, ultimately, the cancellation of the program.