Citation

Salles LMF, de Paula e Silva JMA. Revista Mal Estar e Subjetividade 2010; 10(1): 211-232.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2010, Red de Revistas Cientificas América Latina y el Caribe, España y Portugal.)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

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Abstract

This paper aims to analyze the incidents and the legitimation ofthe youthful violence in leisure spaces and on the street. The study was accomplished with teenagers that live in the periphery of a Brazilian city and frequent a public school in that region. The violence situations occur daily in the neighborhoods where these young live and in the leisure places that they frequent. In this context the young explain and attribute meanings to the violence of which they are sometimes victims and other times protagonists. For the accomplishment of this study, teenagers considered by the school as protagonists of violence situations and others that weren’t considered violent have been interviewed. The interviews were accomplished through focal groups. According to the young, there are a set of rules that guide the youthful behavior that is remarkably competitive, permeated by intolerances and attempts of imposition of lifestyles and manners of acting. The presence of thieves and traffickers groups that impose rules and conduct norms to the inhabitants are also used as explanation for the violence. However, it is important to stand out that if, from one side, the young can be submitted to the rules imposed by the thieves and traffickers with whom they coexist in the community and to the youthful culture because of their age, the testimonies also reveal moments of resistance and ruptures as when the rules and explanations are questioned and other groups become reference.