Para além do "Felizes para Sempre": releituras de Branca de Neve e Cinderela no Ensino de História

Abstract

This bibliographical study aims to analyze the pedagogical and political function of fairy tales in History Education. It investigates how classical narratives operate in the construction of female passivity to serve the patriarchal order and the emerging capitalist system. The study seeks to denaturalize the archetypes of the docile princess and the autonomous witch as complementary historical constructions. It adopts a documentary analysis of mentalities grounded in the categories of gender and symbolic violence. The sources consist of the courtly texts by Charles Perrault and the compilations by the Brothers Grimm, contrasting the rawness of oral peasant traditions with the different processes of domestication and patriarchal appropriation of these narratives. In this sense, the study demarcates the methodological and temporal distance between the authors, contrasting the aristocratic adaptation carried out by Perrault in 17th-century France with the moral and nationalist formatting conducted by the Grimms in the 19th century. Data analysis is anchored in theoretical contributions from women’s history, gender studies, and the critique of primitive accumulation. As a pedagogical product, it presents a teaching sequence grounded in the concept of controlled anachronism. The proposal incorporates the original narrative entitled "Broken Mirrors" (Espelhos Quebrados) to foster students' political agency through a critical reinterpretation of Snow White and Cinderella. The study concludes that these classical tales function as an invisible code of conduct that silences female autonomy. The research demonstrates that the didactic transposition of these stories promotes the awakening of critical-genetic historical consciousness. Finally, it reaffirms the social role of History in dismantling naturalized hierarchies and promoting reflective and politically engaged citizenship.