The other: a critical analysis of discourses on immigration and gender

Abstract

;This article aims to develop a critical analysis of discourses on immigration and the position that some immigrants occupy in the social discourse. The focus is on the minimization process of some groups, highlighting the gender issue and the intersections between sexuality, ethnicity and class, as in the tradition of feminist and post-colonial critical studies. In this regard, we examine some fragments of cases of recently arrived immigrants in a large urban center, São Paulo, Brazil. The position in relation to the immigrant, as a representative of otherness, allowed us to raise some considerations, based on the theory of psychoanalysis, Foucault and feminist and anti-racist studies. In the presented cases, it is noted that the immigration process itself is often not taken into account in the relation with the immigrant, which can naturalize the social differences as individual traits pathologized when not criminalized. Various positions within the social imaginary are highlighted and experienced in the relationship with immigrants. Although with its specificities, one can note that a series of speeches on immigrants are continuously repeated, often referring to them as victims, threats or exotic beings. From this discursive reiteration, we analyze how the other is constituted in this discourse, often appearing as a fetishized other. This analysis aimed to promote critical points for interventions and public policies.

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