Entre vias de opressão e a reprodução das relações de poder na cafeicultura: o terreno acidentado da organização regional Café Mulher

Abstract

The objective of this thesis is to understand how the reproduction of intersectionalities of social markers of differences, in their different faces, are mediated by power relations established between women associated with the regional organization Café Mulher. To achieve this, we resorted to the theoretical-methodological intertwining of postcolonial, intersectional and social markers of differences approaches. The empirical material gathered for the analysis involved narrative interviews with eight heterogeneous women, associated with the regional organization Café Mulher, in the South Region of Minas Gerais, and documentary research. This material was analyzed using Thematic Content Analysis and the use of the analysis lens of the postcolonial approach and the intersectionality of social markers of differences. Three categories of analysis emerged: who are the women associated with the regional organization Café Mulher; the context of the referred organization and the power relations between the associated women. The results lead us to interpret that the women associated with Café Mulher are heterogeneous women, contrary to the universal concept of “woman”. They are women of different colors, professions, such as coffee growers, collectors, pickers, sharecroppers and social classes, who are in coffee farming from 16 to 50 years old and have a very strong family and/or individual involvement with coffee. From the intersections between the social markers of differences, these women occupy different positions in the rough terrain of the regional organization Café Mulher. Souza and Ana, mother and daughter, black women, poor, collectors and collectors, born and raised in the Distrito de Lutas, in the midst of structured power relations still in the slavery period, were identified by us, among the interviewees, as the associates who they are at the crossroads of oppressive sexism, racism and elitism, being hit by an intense flow of traffic that leaves serious marks. Regarding the context of the regional organization Café Mulher, it was founded in the Distrito de Lutas, in 2015, by Maria and Auzira Amélia, white women, coffee growers, owners of their farms and from the upper-middle class, with the aim of helping the collectors, and sharecroppers in the District, however, did not lose focus on the marketing and excluding logic, in reality, aimed at the producers. This objective, therefore, was lost and Café Mulher became a context for reproductions. When black women, who are collectors and collectors, began to hold power, show their resistance and have their voices heard and their presence known, the coffee growers felt uncomfortable, after all, I hurt the narcissistic pact of whiteness. With the creation of Comercializadora Café Mulher South Region of Minas Gerais, linked to Café Mulher, it was no different, the focus is on the capitalization needs of coffee producers. In this context, therefore, the reproduction of power relations between women prevails, mediated by the intersection of ways of oppression such as racism and elitism, which, since the colonial period, seek to keep power in the hands of white people, coffee farmers and owners of their land, placing black, poor women, collectors and gatherers in a subordinate condition.