The representation of the family in Brazilian educational policies

presence or invisibility?

Abstract

This study analyses how the family is represented and signified in Brazilian public educational policies, with particular emphasis on the tensions between the discursive presence of the family and the invisibilisation of family diversity within school curricula. The aim was to examine how legislation and curricular documents incorporate, or silence, the plurality of family arrangements, as well as to identify the ideological barriers that limit their effective recognition in educational contexts. A qualitative approach was adopted, using documentary research and semiotic discourse analysis, grounded in Chizzotti (2014), in order to decode the systems of signs, discursive articulations and silences embedded in normative texts. The analytical corpus comprised the National Education Guidelines and Framework Laws no. 4,024/1961, no. 5,692/1971 and no. 9,394/1996, the National Common Core Curriculum (2017), the Goiás Curricular Document (2019) and the Curricular Proposal for Primary Education – 1st Grade (2023). The results indicate that, although the family is repeatedly mentioned in the analysed documents, its diversity remains treated in a peripheral, fragmented and predominantly declaratory manner, failing to consolidate itself as a structuring principle of the curriculum. Furthermore, the influence of neoliberal and neoconservative rationalities is observed, reinforcing normative family models and shifting educational responsibilities to the private sphere. It is concluded that the effective incorporation of family diversity into educational policies requires confronting these hegemonic rationalities, strengthening teacher education and constructing curricula that recognise family plurality as a constitutive dimension of citizenship education and the democratisation of public education.