ROUTES AND DISCOURSES ABOUT PALEONTOLOGY, TERRITORY AND ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION ON THE “PETER LUND CAVES ROUTE”, MG

Abstract

Many Brazilian geosites are inserted in contexts of socio-environmental problems that enable approaches between Paleontology and Environmental Education, through issues that are important to the Political Ecology and the fight for Environmental Justice. The sites of paleontological importance that are part of the Peter Lund Caves Route (Rota das Grutas Peter Lund) - RGPL, in MG, are an example. Especially, the Sumidouro State Park (Parque Estadual do Sumidouro) - PESU, although very important in terms of its fossil heritage and its tourist relevance, reveals territorial disputes and an invisibilization of the local community, its knowledge and ways of life. Aiming to better understand how the speeches of local subjects can insinuate unequal relationships about Paleontology and belonging to territory and heritage, as well as the Environmental Education – EA that is present in the PESU region, we analyzed, through Critical Discourse Analysis – ACD - interviews carried out with the local community. The results indicate hegemonic discourses that reproduce the capitalist logic of knowledge hierarchization and that insinuate an uncritical and decontextualized EA, revealing to us how groups in privileged positions can contribute to the maintenance of inequalities and oppression in these territories. On the other hand, we also found speeches that reveal the possibility of counter-hegemonic struggle, where Ecology of Knowledge and critical EA have the potential to grow, contesting and hepling to overcome social inequalities. Therefore, we consider these findings important in announcing powerful educational possibilities for a rapprochement between Paleontology and Environmental Education, with community participation in Brazilian geosites.