Conference Program

Across Latin America, educational debates have been deeply shaped by struggles over land, language, recognition, and the democratization of knowledge (Diaz R, et al., 2009). In this context, intercultural education has developed as a political and pedagogical project connected to Indigenous movements and broader claims for social justice. In Brazil, where colonial and racial hierarchies continue to structure access to rights and educational opportunities, intercultural education is closely linked to emancipatory pedagogies and justice-oriented frameworks (Freire, 1987; Tarozzi, 2015). It represents not merely a curricular adaptation, but a transformative horizon aimed at confronting structural inequalities and epistemic subordination (Candau & Russo, 2010; Furtado et al., 2024).

This paper presents a case study of the Programa de Formação de Professores para a Diversidade Étnica (PROETNOS), developed at the State University of Maranhão (UEMA), a public university located in Northeastern Brazil. The program is dedicated to the initial education of Indigenous teachers who will work in their own community schools. It emerged in response to Indigenous political demands for differentiated schooling grounded in interculturality, bilingualism, and the right to cultural self-determination (Guerrero, 2007).

The research is situated within the interpretative qualitative paradigm (Geertz, 1973), assuming intercultural citizenship as a system of meanings constructed within educational contexts. This perspective is articulated with a Freirean critical-emancipatory framework (Freire, 1987), oriented toward examining power relations, recognition processes, and the dynamics of marginalization embedded in teacher education. Methodologically, the study is based on documentary research analyzing institutional regulations and Pedagogical Course Projects (PPC) of the intercultural undergraduate degrees offered within PROETNOS. The analysis was conducted through Content Analysis and Thematic Analysis, supported by Atlas.ti software to structure categories and identify semantic interrelations across documents.

The theoretical framework draws on critical interculturality (Walsh, 2009), distinguishing it from functional approaches that acknowledge diversity without transforming hierarchical structures (Corbetta, 2020). It also engages with reflections on curriculum transformation and pedagogical mediation (Fleuri, 2001; Fiorucci, 2020), as well as with decolonial perspectives that challenge eurocentric epistemologies and the coloniality of power within education (Tavares, 2014; Matos, 2024).

Findings reveal that PROETNOS operates within tensions between national educational regulations and Indigenous community projects. Nevertheless, it illustrates how a public university can act as a space of resistance when it reconfigures its curricular structures to incorporate Indigenous languages, epistemologies, and community participation. Rather than limiting itself to inclusion within an existing monocultural framework, the program seeks to restructure initial teacher education through a decolonial and intercultural lens (Walsh, 2009). In doing so, it contributes to a broader project of social justice that connects access, recognition, and epistemic redistribution (Tarozzi, 2015).

The case demonstrates that, in the Brazilian and Latin American context, public universities can become institutional arenas where democratic renewal, Indigenous protagonism, and curricular transformation intersect (Aguiar, 2025).