Unveiling the self-care of the quilombola woman

Abstract

Objective: To unveil the meanings of quilombola women’s self-care given the social determinants in their territory. Method: a qualitative study with a phenomenological approach in the light ofMartim Heidegger’s framework, carried out with nine quilombola women participating in the Diretório de Mulheres da Colônia do Paiol/MG, Brazil, through phenomenological interviews, analyzed with Heideggerian Hermeneutics. Results:Four Units of Meaning came up: unveiling the well-being of cohabiting in the territory; social determinants interfering in self-care for health; the low performance of health services, accentuating social inequality; and the importance of the Diretório de Mulheres that becomes a social apparatus for rescuing ancestral knowledge. Final considerations: Quilombolas face daily challenges influenced by social determinants that are accentuated by unequal access to services and actions linked to their right to health, and, in this sense, the Diretório de Mulheres appears as a strategy to continue to resist.