Collective narrative practices of women with fibromyalgia

Abstract

This study aims to understand the process of narrative construction through collective narrative practices in group meetings with women with fibromyalgia. This research proposal includes an individual meeting with each of the participants and eight group meetings. Each group will consist of eight to ten participants. All the material produced at those meetings will be analyzed through the principles of collective narrative practices and the following seven axes: 1) to emphasize discourses that support narratives of suffering, contextualizing them historically and socially; (2) recognize alternative narratives; (3) analyze resources and postures that enabled the narrative transformation in the group process; (5) discuss group strategies for working with women with fibromyalgia; (6) discuss the effects and challenges of using collective narrative practices; (7) construe analytical frameworks that dialogue and respond ethically to the principles of narrative practices, resulting in a doctoral dissertation that responds to such principles. This research aims to produce relevant knowledge for the improvement of narrative practices and collective narrative practices in Brazil, so that future research and practices may be implemented. In this regard, this research rationale includes the following: (i) the narrative metaphor attends the self as dynamic and not self-contained; (ii) the possibility of recognizing and construing discourses that enable social transformation, thus allowing the elaboration of new life projects; (iii) collaborating with participants so that they become protagonists of their own lives by proposing a study built "with" and not "of" women with fibromyalgia; (iv) the lack of studies within collective narrative practices and the absence of empirical studies that propose to address fibromyalgia through narrative approaches and (v) the absence of studies of group spaces and narrative practices. (AU)