Universidade e esporte: histórico, espaço-equipamentos e desafios na UFBA

Abstract

The research that results in this Master's Dissertation was carried out with the general objective of analyzing the reality and possibilities for the development of sport at the Federal University of Bahia (UFBA), presenting a history of sports practices at the university, from its creation to the present day, recognizing the Sports and Educational Complex as its main space-equipment and indicating the formative relevance of sport as a strategic challenge in the institutional project of the UFBA. The research has as its object of study the sport in the university and is located among the researches that address the public policies of sports, particularly in the Federal Institutions of Higher Education. The theoretical-methodological basis of the research is referenced in the critical theories of Physical Education, Education and Political Economy – the latter that determines, ultimately, the current reality. The analysis is based on documentary and bibliographic research and on the field study for systematic observation and photographic record of the reality of the UFBA Sports and Educational Complex, notably its spaces and equipment. The search for the nexuses and relations between the singular, the particular and the general chose the historical study about sports in the university, along with the debate regarding sports and educational public policies in the country, its implications with the budgetary difficulties faced by Brazilian federal universities and the consequent subtraction of the right to sports practices in a historical context of dispute over projects, privatization of higher education in the country, fiscal austerity and implementation of neoliberal and imperialist policies that destroy productive forces. From the documentary survey of the legal system and the programs, projects, actions, spaces and sports equipment at UFBA, the present study indicates possible syntheses of the binomial reality and possibilities. The flagrant historical precariousness of the space and equipment for sports and leisure in the Sports Complex and the difficulty in developing teaching, research and extension activities is evident as a reality. The results point out, among the possibilities for the development of sport at the university: the creation of the Faculty of Physical Education; the construction of the Popular Educational Sports Complex; the interdisciplinary, democratic, participatory, inclusive, quality and socially referenced management and administration of sports spaces and equipment, in addition to a series of other educational demands that must be articulated with the institutional project of the university, with a view to the development of an institutional policy that raises the sports cultural standard of the community and promotes sports culture as an axis of humanistic university experience, inclusive and emancipatory.