The gender relations and the feminization of old age

Abstract

This article aims to problematize gender relations as a central element in the discussion of culture, identity and power relations and aims to provoke a reflection on the social role those elderly women occupy in contemporary society. It is a bibliographic research, which questions the existing relations between gender, power and old age seeking some explanations, in the studies of authors suchas Laqueur (2001), Foucault (1978), Louro (2004), Nicholson (2000). And regarding gender and feminization of old age, we chose reference authors, Beauvoir (1970), Debert (1999), Salgado (2002), Neri (2001), Camarano (2005) Connel and Pearse (2015), among others of great value for the discussion. So, extolling the condition of elderly women in contemporary reality presupposes criticism about the role that it occupies and reproduces in brazilian society. Thus, we can think about the discussion of gender linked to social construction and the representation of women in a historical process, seeking autonomy and protagonism.