DEFAMING UFAM IN 3, 2, 1… GO!: MANAUS RESIDENTS’ REPRESENTATIONS OF “OUR GREATEST HERITAGE”

Abstract

This text reflects on the defamatory statements circulating on social media and within families in Manaus regarding public universities, especially the Federal University of Amazonas (UFAM). To explore this topic, we conducted research using appropriate bibliography, which on one hand provides information about the size and importance of Brazilian public universities and, on the other hand, considers the crisis that this institution is experiencing in the West. We also used the category of collective representation analysis, proposed by Roger Chartier (1991), to investigate the role of social networks and their impact on the construction of the image of public universities in the minds of young people entering UFAM. In conjunction with this concept, we employed a semi-structured questionnaire technique based on the experience of authors Galdino Chaer, Rafael Rosa P. Diniz, and Elisa Antônia Ribeiro (2011), offering respondents the opportunity to express their position more coherently. This research instrument was directed at first-year pedagogy students at the Faculty of Education (FACED) of UFAM between the years 2024 and 2025. Based on this theoretical framework, and after constructing the sources with research data, we sought to identify which social sectors potentially benefit from and/or are related to the content disseminated about the institution in question, as well as their political-ideological positions and the main means by which defamation is reproduced.