Female domestic work and social changes in a Brazilian fiction film: insights about the reflective dividend

ABSTRACTThis article aims to examine the reflexivity of the audience for the film The Second Mother, focusing on the social and gender relations constituted, in Brazil, around paid female domestic work. The methodology of this study articulates both filmic and audience discourses. It is based in a reception analysis and considers some films as part of what might be called “the reflective dividend,” a sector of leisure experience which enhances personal and social consciousness about society as an object, and politics as a means to achieve social change. The results of this audience study show the oppressions, either veiled or explicit, that are still practiced today by employers against domestic workers, and by men against women. This article can motivate scholars from different areas to deepen knowledge about the potential of leisure to provide learning, especially in the context of entertainment media. The article contributes more broadly to feminist media studies by examining how class and gender are problematized in a film about social relations and paid domestic work, highlighting the daily implications of this issue for power relations in unequal societies like Brazil.KEYWORDS: Female domestic workgenderfiction filmsBrazilian cinemasocial changes AcknowledgementsI would like to extend special thanks to the interviewees who participated in the study. A very special thanks to Professor Chris Rojek, who kindly reviewed the first version of this manuscript.Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Additional informationFundingThe research that originated this article was supported by the CNPq-National Council for Scientific and Technological Development, and FAPEMIG-Research Support Foundation of Minas Gerais.Notes on contributorsChristianne Luce GomesChristianne Luce Gomes is PhD in Education, with post-doctoral degree in Political and Social Sciences. Full Professor at the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG), Brazil. Researcher at the CNPq-National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq), and FAPEMIG- Research Support Foundation of Minas Gerais, both in Brazil. Coordinator of the Interdisciplinary Master and Doctoral Programmes in Leisure Studies at UFMG (2019-2021). She is the leader of the LUCE Research Group–Ludicity, Culture and Education, and Editor of the Brazilian Journal of Leisure Studies.