EDITORIAL

As we bring to the public the first issue of volume six of Trabalho, educação e saúde, we are pleased to mention that, in January, this periodical was selected to be indexed in one more database, namely, LILACS - Latin American and Caribbean Literature on Health Sciences. This is favorable in various ways, such as increasing the periodical's circulation, further ensuring our international insertion in the academic publishing scenario.

Following the example of the great majority of periodicals, our political and social function is to divulge scientific knowledge, constituting a practice of reflection on science that aims to contribute to the education of workers in general and health workers in particular.

As was stated in previous numbers, the télos of this periodical's conception is "to prevent thought from succumbing to the fetish of the closed totality, the alienated social life, the various forms that domination assumes in our time". The texts collected in this number share in this purpose, thus helping to build the diverse currents of critical thought.

The essay Notes on inflections of the Critical Theory in technical training and education in health, by Isabel Brasil Pereira, relates the legacy of Critical Theory to the problem of education for the emancipation and training of health service workers, in the context of unequal and combined capitalism. Based on the work of Theodor Adorno, which addresses explicitly the difficulties of emancipation, the author reflects on the principle of "educate for the difficult task" in the training of health workers - through a society marked by heteronomy - in counterpoint to a "semi-training" process promoted in the scope of the "administered society".

Roberta Lobo's article, Technology and challenges of contemporary Brazilian education, considers the conceptual discussion on technology. From the standpoint of the relationship between education, culture and technology, the study focuses on the changes in the epistemological status of education in the 20th and 21st centuries. With the theoretical reference centered on the thinking of Herbert Marcuse, particularly his concepts of "critical rationality" and "technological rationality", the author analyzes the possibilities of education preparing young people to participate in the world of culture by exploring the historical and aesthetic imagination, in regard to audiovisual production.

Nursing assistants and technicians in the Family Health: sociodemographic profile and qualification needs is the title of the article by Francisco Rosemiro G. Ximenes Neto et al. The authors carried out an exploratory- descriptive study about the nursing technicians who worked in the Family Health Strategy in some municipalities of the state of Ceará, from March to April of 2005, and their qualification needs.

The article Suffering in teaching: the case of the public network teachers of Montes Claros, Minas Gerais, by Maria Márcia Bicalho Noronha, Ada Ávila Assunção and Dalila Andrade Oliveira, reflects on the illness tendencies of teachers, identifying possible intersections between the excess and strictness of the demands, made without providing the conditions needed for the required teaching work, and the reports of frustration among teachers.

Luciane Prado Kantorski, Fernanda Barreto Mielke, and Sidnei Teixeira Júnior are the authors of the article The work of the nurse in psychosocial care centers, which presents, in the context of the Brazilian psychiatric reform, the work of mental health services, specifically the psychosocial care centers (Caps). It addresses the characteristics of patients and clientele and the team composition, especially the profiles and activities of the nurses.

Roseli Figaro's article, Communication and work activity, discusses the communication and work binomial from the perspective of ergology. It examines the concepts of communication and work, proposing a research approach that will allow better understanding of this binomial.

In the article The importance of ergodesign in the assessment of CD-ROMs about dengue fever and Chagas disease in health education, the authors Denise Nacif Pimenta et al. report a survey and analysis/assessment of digital materials on dengue and Chagas disease that are available in Brazil and a few international institutions.

Paulo Gilberto Simões Dávila et al., in Assessment of the proposal to construct a interdisciplinary curriculum in a technical health school, describe an experience aiming to provide spaces for the training of teachers in health education, based on the practices they developed in school and the views on various forms and levels of curricular integration.

In this issue, Trabalho, educação e saúde brings an interview with Carmen Teixeira, associate professor at the Collective Health Institute of the Federal University of Bahia (ISC/UFBA).

Finally, the reader will find two reviews, on the books Riqueza e miséria do trabalho no Brasil, by Vivian Aranha Sabóia, and Recursos críticos: história da cooperação técnica Opas-Brasil em recursos humanos para a saúde (1975-1988), by Maria Lúcia de Barros Mott.

Isabel Brasil

Angélica Ferreira Fonseca

Carla Macedo Martins

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  18 Oct 2012
• Date of issue
  June 2008