As tramas das emoções nos Círculos de Construção de Paz: entre corpos, vozes e objetos que falam

Abstract

This dissertation investigates the weavings of emotions in Peacebuilding Circles (PBC), understood as entanglements interwoven through voices, gestures, silences, tears, laughter, and the participants’ relationships with the objects that compose the ritual. The Circles are approached as spaces for dialogue organized through their own structure, sustained by elements such as the talking piece, the centerpiece, and the role of the facilitator, which guide interaction and the circulation of speech. The investigation was developed across three empirical fields — Educational, Academic, and Health — constituted throughout the research process because they presented relevant indications for understanding the phenomenon under study. The objective was to understand how the weavings of emotions are manifested in the expressions, discourses, and objects that emerge and acquire meaning within the ritual of the Circles. The methodology adopted was qualitative in nature, with a heuristic attentive to details, guided by participant observation, field diary records, in-depth conversations, and an exploratory questionnaire, all oriented by the method of interpreting clues, which privileges details, traces, and apparently discreet signs of the phenomenon. The theoretical framework articulated contributions from the Sociology and Anthropology of emotions, in dialogue with ritual studies and with the foundations of PBC grounded in Restorative Justice (RJ). The results seem to indicate that emotions are expressed in multifaceted ways, both through what is said, materialized in the shared narratives, and through what remains unsaid, revealed in silences, bodily movements, gazes, and tears that permeate the encounter. Emotional experiences proved to be singular, often produced through interactions among participants and mediated by the ritual structure of the PBC. It is concluded that the weavings of emotions appear to configure dynamic and relational processes, continuously renewed within the ritual, which allows the understanding of the Circles as spaces in which emotions are organized, expressed, and transformed throughout the course of social interaction.