Vivências subjetivas no trabalho de cuidadores sociais na cidade de Manaus-AM

Abstract

The care work involves different dimensions and runs through institutions and their processes of institutionalization. The Psychodynamics of Work - PDT deals with the subjective dimension of work. The work of the social caregiver has implications of social relations of class, race, ethnicity, age, gender. Subjectivity is socially instituted and refers to what is unique, personal and legitimate of each subject. Work has a function in the constitution of the worker as subject, being central in human life and producer of identity in the world. The present study proposed the study of subjective experiences in the work of social caregivers of a host institution who assist children and youngers in situations of social vulnerability in the city of Manaus-AM, in order to promote health of these workers (central objective). It is an action-research of a qualitative nature. The method used was the Work Clinic, proposed by Christophe Dejours, a context in which the speech space and discourses constructed in the collective are privileged. Starting from the categories of analysis proposed by the PDT, with the analysis of work organization, identifying individual and collective strategies of defense and coping, prescribed work and actual work, subjective experiences of pleasure and suffering at work, seeking later to understand the established socio-professional relations and their implications in the construction of this work collective's identity. Regarding the results, the speech of the caregivers brings the precarious conditions of work as aggravating factors of the suffering in the work, signaled by the lack of autonomy in its activities. The research allowed the collective of social caregivers to reflect on the organization of work, through the discourse constructed collectively in the context of the work clinic. In the action of the work of the social caregiver, there is the engagement of subjectivity in its totality. In this sense, it is possible to say that the work of the social caregiver consists in a protection of the subjectivity with respect to the world, since the constitution of its identity is related to its know-how. Defense strategies are observed in the individual and collective dimensions, with negation, rationalization and the ideology of the production of ill-treatment. The coping strategies are flagged in the collective, with the use of practical intelligence and cooperation. The sense of caring work is anchored in subjective experiences, and is shaped by the recognition, signaled as the main source of pleasure in caring work. The study points to the importance of deepening the theoretical-methodological issues of the PDT and contributes to the expansion of this research approach in psychology. This research contributed to the widening of the gaze to the possibilities of delineating a path in the (re)signification of the sense(s) of care work, promoting a qualified listening space and assisting the caregivers in the subjective mobilization in the face of situations that aggravate the suffering at work.