OLIVEIRA, Elisabete Regina B. “My life as an amoeba”: sexual normative scripts and the social construction of asexualities on the internet and in school. 2014. 225 f. Thesis (Doctorate Degree) – Education College, University of São Paulo, São Paulo, 2014

The purpose of this doctoral research is to understand self-identification trajectories of asexual individuals, giving emphasis to their school experiences and interactions during basic education. This is an exploratory qualitative sociological research, part of school sexual diversity studies, under the perspective of gender. In this research, asexuality is understood as a form of sexuality characterized by the disinterest in sexual activity, which may or may not be accompanied by the lack of interest in romantic relationships. Sexual/romantic disinterest - constructed socially, historically and culturally as a psychological or physiological disorder - has been reinterpreted as of the beginning of the 20^th century, as a distinct and legitimate form of sexuality, situated within the broader spectrum of sexual diversity. The emergence of online asexual communities, with varying degrees of mobilization in different countries - including Brazil - has given visibility to this category and has contributed to discussion and research about asexuality. For this research, I interviewed 40 self-identified asexual people – 8 face to face interviews and 32 e-mail interviews - who were contacted through Blog Assexualidades, an online research tool created to facilitate communication with Brazilian asexual individuals and communities. The analysis was based on the constructionist literature on sexuality, particularly John Gagnon and William Simon’s Sexual Script Theory, as well as Joan Scott’s gender theory, among other constructionist theorists. Research results show how sexual normative scripts – i.e. assumptions based on the universality of sexual/romantic interest and the naturalization of sexual activity in romantic relationships as part of social construction of sexuality and gender - permeate respondents’ self-identification experiences, particularly in their internet interactions and their peer relations during the school years. On one hand, online communities and social networks play a significant role in the affirmation of asexuality in contemporaneity, taking into consideration the fact that asexuality was created and has expanded on the internet, gathering people from all over the world around an asexual identity. On the other hand, research findings show that the school environment has been essential for the imposition of gender and sexuality standards that legitimate sexual and heteronormative scripts. However, the school institution has been neglectful about the discussion of the specificities of asexuality and has been doing very little to mediate the tensions that can either guarantee or violate the recognition of sexual diversity in sexuality education initiatives.

Key words: asexuality; sexual diversity; education; sexuality education; gender relations; sexuality

Elisabete Regina Baptista de Oliveira

College of Education, Sociology Department, University of São Paulo, Brazil