Idosas no Brasil do Cólera: Reflexões Psicossociais sobre a Velhice

Abstract

The psychosocial processes that permeate the lives of elderly women and that characterize them were our guide in the research we conducted. With the support of historical-cultural theory and the analysis of literature, especially the book “Love in the Time of Cholera” by the Latin American author Gabriel García Márquez, we addressed various aspects of female aging. As a methodology, we conducted the research with an extensive collection of data about the phenomenon of female aging, through documentary analysis. In view of this, the main objective of this research is to understand the psychosocial processes that permeate and characterize the lives of elderly women. We developed three specific objectives: The first objective is to present an overview of the lives of elderly women, particularly in Brazil, related to their development. The second is to analyze the challenges and potentialities faced by elderly women in relation to the territory they inhabit. The third is to understand female aging through literature. Regarding the theoretical framework, we used Vygotsky's Historical-Cultural Psychology, based on the historical-dialectical materialist method. We brought to the debate a social and cultural panorama of female old age, with art as a mediator for the expression and reworking of emotions. After all, as Vygotsky told us, we believe that the human being is historical and social, also biologically constituted, but over which social and cultural laws have triumphed. This theory, which presents concepts that go beyond the biologizing aspect still very common when talking about human development, shows us that it is marked by the historical conditions of humanity and that it has main activities. Female old ageneeds to be understood based on the analysis of the social relations of production.