Gênero e direito à cidade: estádios de futebol como espaços generificados e arenas de luta das mulheres pela democratização do espaço urbano

Abstract

Football, the most popular sport in Latin America, has become a space for the expression of a heteronormative and virile model of masculinity. As a result of socio-historical processes rooted in the establishment of a patriarchal society and an urbanization process oriented toward the reproduction of capital, the idealization of football stadiums as representations of a masculine aura has generated setbacks in the realization of the right to the city for women, particularly regarding their participation in the public space where football matches take place. However, not without resistance. In this context, aiming to challenge the naturalization of gender stereotypes and the public-private dichotomy, this study seeks to investigate and understand the role and significance of women's struggles for the appropriation of public space and the democratization of football stadiums, one of the many spaces gendered by the capitalist urbanization process, through the actions of the Movimento Feminino de Arquibancada (MFA), a national network of Brazilian female supporters engaged in combating sexism in football. To this end, the research is conducted through a dialectical historical materialist lens and adopts both an interdisciplinary theoretical and bibliographic approach—based on critical feminisms, the concept of the right to the city, and feminist urbanism—and an empirical one, through interviews with members of the MFA, contextualizing their struggle and lived experiences in light of the theoretical literature reviewed.