I have a background in Psychology, with studies in psychoanalysis, and, after years of professional practice with ill people, I got closer to other knowledge and practices. In my research trajectory, I was influenced by the field of Public Policy. The focus of my Master’s degree in Public Health at the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (FIOCRUZ), Rio de Janeiro (RJ), was the evaluation of services and health care for women suffering from advanced cervical cancer. As part of the research group at Fundação Getúlio Vargas (RJ), I also sought to address the social determinants of the health-disease-care process, with an emphasis on the study of prejudice and discrimination in the access and use of health services, as expressions of social and racial inequality. In this same group, I became interested in the study of citizenship and discrimination in Public Policies.
My experience as executive secretary of the Brazilian Center for Health Studies (CEBES), a Brazilian civil society organization, allowed me to get closer to social movements and the exercise of health activism. Touched by this experience, I focused my doctorate in Public Health on the study of social activism in health, taking into account the changes in information and communication technologies in contemporary society, and looking for new references to understand them, from a decolonial perspective.
I have also worked in the area of health education and communication, participating in the management and pedagogical teams of Specialization Courses in Collective Health, with emphasis on Primary Health Care, at the Collective Health Institute (ISC) at the Federal University of Bahia. Here, I understood the importance of training health professionals, with the ethical commitment to contribute to changing work processes in the health care of the population in their territory. In addition, I participated in an extension project with a community in the city of Salvador (BA), aiming at the political formation and empowerment of the individuals involved to work in their life contexts.
I am excited to participate in the ECLIPSE project, with an interest in researching “Black female empowerment in the fight in health and coping with neglected disease in three territories”. This will enable me to build on my research interest of activism, social and racial inequalities. I am passionate about confronting and sustaining the female position in the society in which I live, and constantly seek knowledge as a way of empowering women. I therefore maintain very positive expectations about ECLIPSE!