Abstract

FERREIRA, Marcelo Santana. Children, sexual politics and the writing of the self. Rev. Polis Psique [online]. 2016, vol.6, n.spe, pp. 51-64. ISSN 2238-152X.

This article is a reflection on the invention of childhood as a bio-political artifact as conceived by Paul Beatriz Preciado, and an examination of contemporary efforts to break away from the primacy of control exerted on us by means of the dispositif of sexuality. Using fragments from literary texts by contemporary Brazilian writers such as Caio Fernando Abreu and Marcio El-Jaick, we seek to understand institutional operations that dictate consistency and unity in the experience of childhood, especially with regard to sexuality. In the texts by Abreu and El-Jaick, we find a renewed approach and a critique of the experience of self in childhood which breaks with the idealization of childhood and the compulsory pathologization of minor affects. We engage in dialogue with the thought of Walter Benjamin and Michel Foucault to argue that other ways of being-child have been making the political arena denser and more open to new regimes of self.

Keywords : Writing of the Self; Childhood; Literature.