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Racism in the academic world: a topic to discuss at university

Access of black students to universities has grown in recent years. But researchers still face difficulties in standing out in the scientific world

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How many black professors did you have, or do you have, in your undergraduate course? And scientific innovations and new technologies, do you know how many and which of them were developed by black researchers? Not having answers to these questions is one of the many ways in which racism manifests itself in society. In Black Awareness Month, the Journal of Unicamp proposes an important discussion for those who work with the production of knowledge in the country: what can be done to combat racism in the academic world? We spoke with professors from different areas of the university and they all agree that focusing on diversity is a guaranteed path to building science that benefits the whole of society. 

Epistemicide: who killed our knowledge?

One of the foundations of modern Western culture is the idea of ​​Eurocentrism. In this worldview, everything that comes from Europe - culture, arts, languages, religions, politics - and European societies is seen as superior in relation to other peoples in America, Africa, Asia and Oceania. It was with this thought that several European countries worked to expand their ways of thinking and acting around the world, subjugating other cultures.

With universities this was no different. In Brazil, the first was the Bahia School of Surgery, created in 1808 in the wake of other benefits introduced in the colony to welcome the Portuguese royal family. Without the presence of Europeans, the Eurocentric mentality made it impossible to create educational institutions in America, after all, the people of the global South would not be endowed with knowledge or culture. 

Centuries after the political independence of Latin American countries - decades, in the case of African and Asian countries -, this inequality began to draw the attention of scholars who began to challenge this reality, not only between who could or could not produce science and knowledge. , but also the predominance of an essentially European worldview and science. One of them was the Portuguese Boaventura de Sousa Santos, creator of the term "epistemicide". For him, the destruction of the knowledge and traditions of people who were targets of colonial exploitation is one of the forms of genocide applied by European colonizers. 

Mario Augusto Medeiros: "A very cruel facet of racism is the loss of memory"
Mário Augusto Medeiros, professor at IFCH: "A very cruel facet of racism is the loss of memory"

In the case of the black population, this reality appears as one of the facets of the structural racism of our society. The signs of epistemic racism appear not only in the limitations on access for black men and women in universities, but also when the knowledge produced by them is disregarded. For Mario Augusto Medeiros da Silva, professor of Sociology at the Institute of Philosophy and Human Sciences (IFCH) from Unicamp, this gives rise to a vicious cycle that leads to the forgetting of the scientific contributions made by these people. "A very cruel facet of racism is the loss of memory, collective and social memory. If we don't have the scientific memory of black people, we say that they never existed and people who are at university today have no one to look up to. mirroring. This is very serious", comments the professor.

Affirmative actions to reduce inequalities

With the aim of reducing this historical gap between whites and blacks, in 2012 the 12.711 Law, which provides for the implementation of racial and social quotas for entry into federal universities and medical and technical education institutions. At Unicamp, the adoption of ethnic-racial quotas was approved in November 2017 by the University Council. They came into effect in the 2019 Entrance Exam, an edition in which the university's first Indigenous Entrance Exam was also held.

The results can already be seen in the numbers. On November 13th, IBGE released the results of the survey Social Inequalities by Color and Race in Brazil. The study shows that, for the first time, the number of black students in the country exceeded 50%. In 2018, black and mixed-race students represented 50,3% of total enrollments in public Higher Education institutions in the country. 

Despite this achievement, inequalities are still identifiable in the academic world. Different surveys, carried out by press vehicles - Nexo newspaper and G1 portal - show some of the advances in the quota policy and that access is still not the same in all areas. They are based on data from the 2016 Higher Education Census, an edition that showed the distribution of black students in the country. A comparison of Nexus Among the most sought after courses, they show that the degrees that most include black and mixed-race students are Social Service, Degrees in Literature and Chemistry, Human Resources and Nursing. Those with the smallest number of black and brown people were Medicine, Veterinary Medicine, Chemical Engineering, Design and Advertising. Of the 50 courses considered in the Nexo newspaper survey, none of the engineering courses had more than 50% of black and mixed-race students. 

Even though it is the beginning of a process, the presence of black students in undergraduate courses already stimulates changes and discussions that are not yet familiar to all researchers. Second Deborah Jeffrey, professor at the Faculty of Education and president of the Advisory Committee on Ethnic-Racial Diversity (Cader) at Unicamp, it is when students show interest in these topics that many teachers begin to think about it. "It's a discussion that, officially, is not present. We come to this topic much more through students who bring up this theme, these discussions to rethink epistemology based on culture, black, Afro-Brazilian philosophy, than necessarily a recurring discussion in everyday life, of having a university that is very much based on the production of European or North American knowledge", explains Debora. 

Debora Jeffrey: "It's a discussion that, officially, is not taking place"
Debora Jeffrey, president of Cader: "It's a discussion that, officially, is not taking place"

The expected trend is that this increase in the number of black students in undergraduate courses will result in more black university professors in the future. This is a need also verified in data from the Higher Education Census, now collected by the portal G1: of the approximately 400 thousand university professors evaluated in 2016, only 16% identified themselves as black and mixed race. Those who had already completed a master's degree were 23%, while only 17,6% had a doctorate. A clear indication that the rise in scientific research comes up against the limitations imposed by racism. 

"You're in a white world"

Today, those who are at the university as professors look back and identify all the limitations that racism imposes on teaching and the world of research. Everardo Magalhães Carneiro, associate director of the Institute of Biology (IB), recalls that, when he entered the Nursing course at Unicamp, in 1978, he was the only black student in his class. He says that some of the subjects were taught together with medical students, a course made up of only white students at the time. After studying for a master's and doctorate and working as a professor at two other institutions, he joined the university's faculty in 1999. 

The experience of following this path during a period before affirmative policies made him see how much racism was built throughout the country's history and is reflected in the academic space. "This is a structure set up since the time of colonization, when slaves arrived here. It went from the slave quarters to the house, from the house to the school, from the school to society, from society to the university. These stigmas have not been lost. It is It's hard to believe that this still happens in the country. Right here, when I talk to colleagues, they say 'this doesn't exist, you're dreaming'. But they can't realize this because this vision is ingrained in them", comments Everardo. 

Everaldo Carneiro, associate director of IB: "This is a structure set up since the time of colonization"
Everardo Carneiro, associate director of IB: "This is a structure set up since the time of colonization"

He analyzes that, as it is a structural factor in Brazilian society, actions that have racism as a backdrop often go unnoticed by people. In academia, they appear, for example, in subjective criteria attributed in evaluations or in the discrediting of speeches and comments made in meetings and assemblies. "Even the discriminator doesn't realize this, but his gaze and attitudes are embedded in him. When you talk about the insertion of black people in any activity, when there is an evaluator on the other side, he is probably looking more critically. This is within him, he you can't control it", explains the professor. 

Sílvia Maria Santiago, professor at the Faculty of Medical Sciences (FCM), shares a similar experience with Everardo: she joined the Medicine course as a student in 1977 and then as a professor in 1985, she feels that black researchers had and still have more difficulties not only in entering the academic world, but also in giving visibility for their research, especially when they talk about topics that relate to the well-being of the black population and the fight against racism. 

"When I entered university, in 1977, to study medicine, there were no black people here, I was the only one for several years. So you try to stay a little in the shadows, you are in a world of white people, the elite of society. You She tries not to show up too much, she almost suffers cultural whitewashing", shares Sílvia. She also comments that the structure of institutions also limits this work, such as the difficulty in obtaining funding for research that directly impacts the black population, or the lack of interest of scientific journals in publishing the results. 

The experiences reported by teachers show a reality lived in the field of exact and biological sciences. This raises a question: even if, in one way or another, all black researchers suffer the consequences of racism, is the trajectory more difficult for this field of science? Is there a greater opening in the Humanities and Social Sciences? The answer is not restricted to a “yes” or “no”. 

All science involves a worldview

Several factors interfere with the opening that science offers to a black researcher or to research that discusses the demands of this population. In their trajectories, closer to Biological and Exact Sciences, Everardo and Sílvia realize that researchers in Human and Social Sciences are able to give more visibility to these themes compared to other areas. "I think that the fact that more people go to the Humanities and Social Sciences side is because there is more receptivity in the environment that controls this, and then allows this individual to have more chances to enter. In the sociological field it is much more difficult for you to discriminate than in the biological or exact fields", interprets Everardo. 

For Sílvia, this is an issue that has to do with Brazilians' own awareness of admitting, or refusing, that racism is present in society. "I think that, in the Human Sciences, the subject is on the agenda. In Brazil, we deny racism a lot, there is the myth of racial democracy, so people will deny this in a predominantly white environment. Nobody wants to be racist, but at At the same time, the product of your actions is racist, which is silencing, for example. So when you talk about it, people cringe”, points out the teacher. 

Sílvia Santiago, FCM teacher: "You try to stay a little in the shadows, you are in a world of white people"
Sílvia Santiago, professor at FCM: "In Brazil, we deny racism a lot"

Looking at the issue from the point of view of Human Sciences, Mário Augusto explains that this perception occurs due to the fact that disciplines such as Sociology, History, Anthropology and others in the humanities constantly reflect on themselves and on the relationships between people. Therefore, issues such as racism and its fight are more present. However, he considers that all sciences involve a worldview. For him, there is a more direct relationship with the access of black students to a good education in elementary and secondary education, before entering university. “It doesn’t necessarily mean less ability to access these fields of knowledge, but for black and non-black people, the relationship with the world of mathematics, physics, chemistry, is another language, it’s like learning music. You need to learn another language, which is not simple. A series of mechanisms and tools are needed, it's not exactly talking to parents on a day-to-day basis. This goes through people in a more complex way who had a generally worse starting point in the black and indigenous world.” 

In search of recognition

About six months ago, João Vilhete Viegas d'Abreu e Odair Marques da Silva, teachers linked to the Center for Information Technology Applied to Education (down), started a project with the aim of making research and technological projects undertaken by black students, teachers and researchers from Brazil and other parts of the world better known. And the Brazil Afrotech Map, a website where different initiatives can be registered and located by georeferencing. According to the professors, this not only allows people outside the world of science to learn about these works, but also for the researchers themselves to know that they are not alone in academia. 

"We thought, 'wow, we have relationships with several black researchers and professors at universities, but the quota students who are entering, the other non-quota students, high school students, when they research science, have no reference about this'. There was no open, public database that concentrated this type of data. So we created Mapa Brasil Afrotech", explains Odair Silva. At the time of writing this report, 37 projects were in the database, which can be accessed by anyone. 

Odair Marques da Silva and João Vilhete d'Abreu, organizers of Mapa Brasil Afrotech
Odair Marques da Silva and João Vilhete d'Abreu, organizers of Mapa Brasil Afrotech

Professors believe that the platform can contribute to the careers of black researchers, making their work better known, and also to their self-esteem, giving them the feeling of belonging to the same universe. "We are always the minority. Although we are the majority, we are always one, two, where there are thousands of non-blacks. Normally what happens is that black people who do science, who produce knowledge within this minority become invisible. Maybe initiatives such as this can serve this purpose, including for black people themselves to become aware that they need to become visible", reports João Vilhete. 

Mapa Brasil Afrotech is one of several initiatives that researchers have available to combat racism in academic relations and also contribute to the well-being of the black population. Sílvia Santiago chose to relate her work with the FCM Public Health Department to the demands presented by black patients in health services, especially women. “I research what my work, on a day-to-day basis, brings to me as reality. So inevitably I was invaded by this topic, because you see how a black patient is treated, or do research on how the black population is distributed in epidemiology. The data leads you to this", says Sílvia.

Everardo also believes that the work of researchers, black or not, is fundamental for epistemic racism to be combatted. For him, this does not necessarily depend on carrying out research on this topic. “Just the fact that you are part of an institute like this, which has a white majority, the black cause has already been valued, you have managed to overcome barriers. What do I think is important to do? Recruit, into my laboratory, into my spaces, more black people", analyzes the professor. 

Union of efforts and commitment to diversity

As a way of continuing the actions to include black students at the university, this year Unicamp created the Ethnic-Racial Diversity Advisory Committee (Cader) and held for the first time the UnicampAfro, an event that brings together activities and discussions about the contribution of the black population to the historical and cultural formation of the country. "UnicampAfro has this purpose, in addition to being a moment of celebration, to promote this meeting of black researchers, students, teachers, employees, and that we can, from this, continue this dialogue, socializing knowledge, giving visibility to research that are ongoing and new themes”, explains Debora Jeffrey, who also coordinates the event’s activities. 

Debora highlights the importance of initiatives that bring together black researchers and, to this end, explains that one of the works that will be carried out by Cader is the organization of a database that brings together all the scientific production carried out by black students, teachers and researchers at Unicamp. “We are planning for the 1st semester of 2020 to carry out a survey of all this production, so that we have this collection that serves as a basis for new researchers, from scientific initiation to post-doctorate", reveals the professor. She also comments which aims to strengthen ties between Unicamp and ABPN, the Brazilian Association of Black Researchers. 

Created in 2000, ABPN aims to bring together black researchers and research that aims to contribute to the fight against racism and the inequalities caused by it. One of the main actions carried out by the association in this regard is the promotion of Copene, the Brazilian Congress of Black Researchers, which takes place in national and regional editions. The association also maintains the ABPN Magazine, a scientific journal dedicated to research on this topic. According to the president of ABPN, Nicea Quintino Amauro, professor at the Federal University of Uberlândia, the magazine publishes around 150 articles per year, which shows the great demand for studies carried out in the country. 

She emphasizes that Copenes are important so that research carried out by black people in the country has space for wide dissemination. “Next year, in 2020, it (the national Copene) will take place between November 9th and 12th in Curitiba, at the Federal University of Paraná. At this moment, ABPN brings together approximately four thousand people, for the next one we are preparing an event for five thousand and it is a moment of scientific dissemination, so that the research carried out by black people and the promotion of good living for the black population is better identified and understood by the academic community and people who are interested in this research", says Nicéa. 

The effects of these actions, combating racism and discrimination in the academic environment, are not restricted to universities, but extend to society as a whole. Mário Augusto Medeiros states that it is by investing in diversity of thoughts that universities are able to fulfill their role of making society advance in a positive way for everyone. "This is a bet on the future, a bet on diversity, on making our worldview and our vision of science more complex. This is a bet against epistemic racism, because we attack the cause of this racism, which is not talk about, make invisible subjects who, historically, make up the social formation of Brazil", assesses the professor.

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Access of black students to universities has grown in recent years. But researchers still face difficulties in standing out in the scientific world

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