ABSTRACT
In Brazil, the proposals of leisure and idleness have different perspectives. Therefore, the objective of this work is to analyze the understanding of social actors of a government physical activity program about leisure and idleness. This was a qualitative case study. The program and participants were selected intentionally. An in-depth interview was adopted for data collection and saturation was used to determine the number of participants. For interpretation of the data, critical discourse analysis was applied using a sociocognitive approach. As main results, we found a predominance of the hegemonic discourse related to leisure in Brazil, notably rest, fun and consumerism and a lack of knowledge about idleness. Regarding social practice, the experiences of the participants in the program mostly do not match the theoretical assumptions related to leisure, but are characterized as experiences of idleness. Based on the discourses analyzed, we conclude that people re-signify their leisure practices, establishing a paradox between what is theoretically proposed and what is experienced daily, and understand physical activity from a functionalist perspective.
Keywords:
Discourse; Subjectivities; Concepts