Graduate Program in Technology and Society

The Graduate Program in Technology and Society - PPGTE, from UTFPR, was created in 1995, proposing to work in an interdisciplinary context, bringing together research professors from different areas of knowledge: Languages, History, Sociology, Engineering, Physics, Mathematics, Psychology, Education, Arts, Design, Philosophy, Engineering, Architecture, Law, Environment - around the investigations that encompass the interactions between Technology and Society.

Over this period, PPGTE has deepened and matured its research. It received from the CAPES Evaluation Committee, concept five, showing that it has become stronger with each passing year.

It is understood that human society stands out for its ability to change the environment in which it operates and these changes also imply modifications in the physiognomy of this society. Discoveries, innovations and technological advances, such as fire, the use of metals, writing, the press, modern machinery, electricity, the internet and many others, have characterized the history of humankind in its interaction with nature and with the social environment. These technological changes have been constant in the history of humankind, who makes and redoes each new technical invention, causing changes in all segments of society and requiring understandings that can be obtained through scientific research in various areas of knowledge.

In this context, the purpose of this Program is to research the transformations that these changes cause in the activities performed by society in a material and cultural scope. In this step, PPGTE is interested in checking how innovations interfere in people's lives, in their way of working, learning, thinking, symbolizing and acting in the world. The visions, representations and impacts of technology on human life and the natural environment should be investigated and analyzed from an interdisciplinary perspective, given the complexity of the study. Understanding these changes as interfering in the totality of material and immaterial life, the Program privileges interdisciplinary research as an articulating element of the projects, lines of research, disciplines and seminars it offers. To this end, it offers the research student a cadre of professors from various areas of knowledge that address the universe of technology, seeking to approach it in a multidisciplinary and non-disciplinary manner.

In this context of dynamic change in society, in which the historically situated man/woman acts on himself/herself and his/her surroundings, it is necessary not only to analyze and problematize these changes, but also to propose technological solutions that contribute to the strengthening of a fairer and more supportive  society in which a technicist thinking and acting do not predominate, but rather a reflective thinking focused on a democratic performance in relation to the world of technology.

Area of ​​Concentration

Technology and Society

Research Lines

With the framework of interdisciplinarity as a reference, the Program is organized around three lines of research:

- Mediations and Cultures

Coordination: Dr. Marilda Lopes Pinheiro Queluz
The research line Mediations and Cultures is part of the Graduate Program in Technology (PPGTE) of the Technological University of Paraná - Campus Curitiba. The program's area of concentration is Technology and Society and, as a result of this concentration, is evaluated by the CAPES Interdisciplinary Area Coordination, in particular by Thematic Chamber II - Social & Humanities.

One of the Program's assumptions is to foster critical and citizen understanding of technology. The Technology and Interaction line appeared in 1999, after the reformulation of the Program, which until then had areas of concentration in Education and Technological Innovation. With the change, it assumed a close correlation between technologies and human activities.

However, over the course of a decade, it was noticed that the terms technology and interaction were often understood instrumentally only as actions performed through tools, means, or artifacts. In addition, the use of the word interaction seems redundant, since it is a process that belongs to the whole program, covering the three current lines of research.

The change in 2011 to Mediations and Cultures aimed to increase the possibilities of understanding technology. The choice of Mediations also aimed to highlight the plural approaches fostered in the line and in the program. Technologies in this sense were not restricted to artifacts and instruments, although they permeate them. It is assumed that the human being is made collectively by social relations, in the mediations (material or symbolic). In this perspective, technologies are always social mediations (material or symbolic), situated and axiologically, culturally and historically detailed.

Cultures are the articulated sets of actions and constraints, interactions and influences, relationships and techniques, trends and deviations, motivations and directions, resources and possibilities that are present in a society at a given time and space. In this sense, cultures include technologies, conditioning and transforming them dialectically and dialogically.

Dealing with plural terms reinforces the fact that mediations and cultures are inseparable and also multiple. These can be researched from a myriad of perspectives, albeit with contradictions, and require equity and respect for particularities and differences.

The interest of the line is the knowledge and circulation of techniques, processes, practices, artifacts, media, environments and other mediations. Social relations are permeated by memories, values and interests, which permeate and tint, for example, interactive and printed media, institutional and domestic spaces, public and private, formal and non-formal learning and teacher education processes. , cultural and intercultural relations, the construction of subjectivities and their transformations, among others.

From these assumptions, the Mediations and Cultures line develops interdisciplinary projects in the historical cultural dimensions of technologies as social mediations, situated and circumscribed in various cultures and contexts.

It also seeks to discuss the implications of technologies in the intermediation of human activities and values. Therefore, key objects of this research line are art, design, education and the media.

The research line is formed by the following researchers:

• Dr. Herivelto Moreira - technological education, pedagogical practice, continuing education, teacher education and research methodology.
• Dr. Luciana Martha Silveira - color, art, technology.
• Dr. Marilda Lopes Pinheiro Queluz - material design and culture, technology and culture, history of Brazilian art, history of graphic arts and graphic humor (caricature and comics)
• Dr. Marília Amaral - Human Interaction Computer, interaction design, computer science in education, focusing on open and democratic computing.
• Dr. Marinês Ribeiro dos Santos - Design Studies, with emphasis on material culture and its interfaces with the domestic space and gender relations.
• Dr Nestor Cortez Saavedra Filho - Conception, Development and Evaluation of Educational Objects mediated by teaching-learning theories. Open Educational Resources (OER) and their use in an educational environment. Educational Object Repositories and OER.
• Dr. Luiz Ernesto Merkle - relations between Informatics and Society, in particular in free technologies and cultures, in interaction design, always directed towards an education for freedom.
• Dr. Ronaldo Oliveira Corrêa - material culture, design, gender, technology, crafts, cultural heritage.
• Dr. Leonelo Dell Anhol Almeida - accessibility and digital inclusion, human-computer interaction and interaction design, collaborative systems and participatory design.

- Technology and Development

Coordination:  Dr. Faimara do Rocio Strauhs
The research line Technology and Development seeks to investigate, reflect, discuss, simulate, instigate themes related to elements and the dynamics of sustainable territorial development processes. In this sense, the research is oriented to aspects of the process of appropriation and transformation of geographic spaces, holders of natural resources and specific infrastructure, conducted by groups of actors, integrated in social, cultural and economic networks (territoriality). Studies in this line also turn to the conditions necessary for the continuous and durable development of the territory, thus manifesting themselves as processes necessarily thought and implemented under the social, economic and environmental tripod (sustainability).

From an interdisciplinary perspective and, seeking a better understanding of the factors that act in the social construction of technology in the context of the dynamics of territoriality and sustainability, the themes of this line also dialogue with those proposed in the other lines of research of PPGTE.

Regarding the sphere of action of knowledge production of the line, from the perspective of Sustainable Territorial Development, especially urban, the following stand out: Bioclimatic Architecture, Cities, Urban Climatology, Sustainable Construction and Architecture,Ecodesign,Environmental Education, Energy Policy and Development, Future Studies, Environmental Management, Solid Waste Management, Knowledge Management, Socioeconomic and Environmental Indicators, Public Policy, Networks Sociotechniques, Appropriate Technologies, Technology and Innovation.

The research line has the following research professors:

• Dr. Christian Luiz da Silva
• Dr. Dario Eduardo Amaral Dergint
• Dr. Decio Estevão do Nascimento
• Dr. Eloy Fassi Casagrande Junior
• Dr. Faimara do Rocio Strauhs (Line Coordinator)
• Dr. Maclovia Corrêa da Silva
• Dr. Silvestre Labiak Junior
• Dr. Valdir Fernandes

- Technology and Work

Coordination: Dr. Geraldo Augusto Pinto

In this line of research, there is a reflection on the centrality of work in the constitution of human society, that is, work is understood in its ontological dimension from which humankind, not only alters, creates and modifies its surroundings through its  work, but rather it is established as a human being in and through work.

Work and Technology are also perceived in their intimate association, articulation and contradiction from a critical historical perspective that considers these dimensions as the result of intense human activity that distances itself from an approach that perceives technology in an autonomous, neutral and deterministic perspective.

In Technology and Work, there are historical, cultural and economic realities and they create, impact, modify, alter the socionatural environment. These changes and modifications are analyzed and investigated mainly from the scope of education, literature, history, sociology, advertising, journalism, philosophy and psychology. 

From this perspective, the Research Line seeks to investigate the following themes:

Technology and its relations with education;
 History of technique and technology;
 History of technical and vocational education;
 Production and appropriation of knowledge by the worker;
 Technology and gender relations;
 Cultural dimensions of technology;
 Public policies for vocational education;
 Discursive constructions of technology and work in the literary, journalistic and advertising fields;

Social Technology and Solidarity Economy

This group has the participation of the following professors from PPGTE:

• Dr. Andrea Maila Voss Kominek
• Dr. Angela Maria Rubel Fanini
• Dr. Claudia Nociolini Rebechi
• Dr. Domingos Leite Lima Filho
• Dr. Francis Kanashiro Meneghetti
• Dr. Gilson Leandro Queluz
• Dr. Geraldo Augusto Pinto
• Dr. Maria Sara de Lima Dias
• Dr. Marilene Zazula Beatriz
• Dr. Mario Lopes Amorim
• Dr. Nanci Stancki da Luz
• Dr. Nilson Marcos Dias Garcia