PEDAGOGICAL POSSIBILITIES FOR THEMATIZING ATHLETICS IN THE CULTURAL CURRICULUM OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION
athletics; culture; curriculum; artistry; Physical Education.
The present study aimed to understand athletics as a text of body culture, subject to reading, interpretation, and production through language. Through post-critical theories of the Cultural Curriculum in Physical Education, the forms of signification of athletics were expanded under a multicultural perspective. The objective of the research was to provide didactic situations that addressed athletics from the perspective of the cultural curriculum in Physical Education, aiming at the formation of individuals with identities that are empathetic towards differences. Regarding the theoretical framework, discussions were mobilized about the role of school and Physical Education in the production of body identities in postmodern times, as well as the curricular theories of Physical Education, the didactic-methodological aspects of the Cultural Curriculum in Physical Education, and athletics as body culture and its implications in the school curriculum. As for the investigative process, the research was conducted at EMEF Joao Belo Alves, located in the rural area of the municipality of Picui, in the state of Paraiba. The target audience consisted of students from the 6th and 7th grades of elementary school, totaling 41 participants of both genders, with an average age between 11 and 15 years. The research methodology was based on a qualitative approach, specifically action research, with the purpose of modifying the reality of teachers and students. The data production procedures were carried out through questionnaires, observation, and a field journal. In data analysis, we used cultural discourse analysis, placing the body culture of athletics at the center of discursive productions to analyze the relationship between knowledge and power present in the students' discourses. As a result, athletics was consolidated as a text of body culture, as the implementation of the cultural curriculum led to a shift from a technical-sports curriculum to a cultural curriculum. The didactic situations, based on post-critical theories, recognized the discursive production of students, promoting a curriculum writing or a curriculum artistry, producing knowledge that emerges differently in each class and for each group. Finally, the cultural thematization of athletics broadened the forms of signification of this body practice, problematizing, deconstructing, and re-signifying discourses marked by prejudices and discrimination during physical practice. This contributed to the formation of individuals with identities empathetic to any type of social marker that emerged during the classes, such as gender, race, ethnicity, sexuality, and body standards, among others, which are common in a multicultural, contemporary, and globalized school.