O que as aias têm a contar?: uma análise da mediação de gênero a partir da recepção das telespectadoras de The Handmaid's Tale (2017-)

Abstract

This paper aims to investigate the perceptions about questions related to binary gender brought up by TV series The Handmaid’s Tale (2017–) by analyzing how female spectators that are members of Facebook groups The Handmaid‟s Tale Brasil (2018) and The Handmaid‟s Tale – Brasil (2017) absorb what they watch. The bibliographical research is based upon authors like Martín-Barbero (1987, 2011), Guillermo Orozco Gómez (2005, 2011), Joan Scott (1995), Ana Maria Colling (2004) and Ana Carolina Escosteguy (2002). The methodology used is qualitative research, integrated with bibliographical, exploratory and empirical procedures. The exploratory procedure is composed of the mapping and observation of the Facebook groups, while the empirical investigation is constituted of a questionnaire based on the exploratory part of the research. The results led us to conclude that the most recurring themes in the spectators‟ answers were the violence between women, in which female characters themselves have to negotiate their position on a violent and oppressive social structure; the men‟s cowardice at the moment of the “ceremony”; and the religious fanaticism allied with politics. Considering all characters from the series, the female receptors related more to the ones called “handmaids‟.