Program Overview

Objectives

The Graduate Programs in Home Economics (PPGED) offers Master’s and Doctoral programs that aim to train researchers, professors and professionals to produce, disseminate and apply knowledge on family issues and their interrelationship with society. Focused on this area, the PPGED aims to enable students to interpret and understand the economic and symbolic processes of the family and the relationships of interaction with other systems in society public scenario. It also seeks to provide conditions to train researchers and teachers for teaching, research and extension activities in public and private institutions that develop projects and programs for the social improvement and increased life quality of individuals, families and groups.

The Program is structured to enable students to:

1. a) Reflect on aspects that constitute and affect the daily life of individuals, families and groups, considering cultural values, labor conditions, technologies and strategies of production, distribution and consumption of goods and services in different moments and contexts;
2. b) Understand family configurations with their structures, arrangements, dynamics, reflect on the transformations arising from the different stages of life cycle, as well as the economic and social conditions, considering family as a dynamic and plural group;
3. c) Analyze the historical processes of constitution and transformation of socio-cultural identities, focusing on the markers of gender, class, generation, race and ethnicity;
4. d) Investigate the socio-spatial and socio-environmental processes related to the occupation of space, living conditions and housing, as well as mechanisms of integration, sociability, support networks and forms of empowerment in different moments and contexts;
5. e) Investigate the relations between the processes of socioeconomic development in the Brazilian society, such as projects, programs and policies for the promotion of human and social development;
6. f) Assess plans, programs, projects and policies aimed at the family and specific groups, including children, adolescents, youth, elderly, women, people with disabilities, as well as individuals under vulnerable conditions.

History

The Post-Graduate Program in Home Economics is linked to the Department of Home Economics (DED) and to the Center for Human Sciences, Letters and Arts of the Federal University of Viçosa (CCH-UFV), adding Masters and Doctorate courses. The Master’s Degree in Domestic Economics, implemented in 1992, was the first stricto sensu course at the Center for Human Sciences, Letters and Arts (CCH) at UFV. The approval of the Doctorate on 12/12/2013 and the beginning of its activities in August 2014, strengthened the CCH and expanded the possibilities for research growth in the areas of Applied Human and Social Sciences.

In its 28 years of existence, the Program has been consolidating its mission to train qualified teachers, researchers, and professionals to work in teaching, research and extension in the Family area in its multiple relationships with society, following an educational policy identified with the problems and issues affecting the family and society. PPGED establishes as a vision of the future to be a national and international reference in the academic education of professionals who research and work in the Family area in their multiple relations with society.

Since the defense of its first dissertation, the Program has graduated 333 researchers at Master’s level and 24 at Doctoral level, who occupy the most diverse areas of the public and private sector. The Program is a reference in the region in research, training, and academic production, stimulating and enhancing the performance of teachers, researchers, and professionals, contributing to the social inclusion of the program. Investigations within the scope of the Program have revealed the cleavages that family and community groups assume in different contexts, both with regard to aspects related to human and social development, as well as issues associated with consumption, specificities related to work, employment, income generation, and consequences of unemployment, in addition to aspects related to the aging process, children/adolescents and their rights, access, and occupation of space, factors that are strongly marked by gender, class, race, and ethnic identities.

Over almost three decades of existence, the Program has had a performance marked by strong social insertion, developing agreements and actions aimed at social and family development, not only in Brazil but also in Latin America. The generation of knowledge that the Program has been producing has been reflected in the national context, in the support of public policies, in the implementation of programs and actions aimed, especially, at improving the living conditions of families in social vulnerability. Knowledge of the specificities of families and their social networks are subsidies in the formulation and realignment of social policies, so that they can be closer to the needs and interests of the subjects served.