Escola e sociedade de consumidores: um estudo com crian？as "catadoras"

this article presents the results of a study whose main purpose was to analyze the meanings attributed to the recycling of solid residues by a group of children of a municipal school located in sao leopoldo , brazil. these schoolchildren had their existence tied to that work. empirical data was composed by interviews, conducted with eight children, which were based on pictures that they had previously drawn and notes registered in field diary. the theoretical framework of this research is based on michel foucault's thinking, wittgenstein's later ideas and the work of zygmunt bauman. it was possible to infer from the research data analysis that those children participated in the recycling work mainly because they wanted to consume, being integrated into consumer society via "differential inclusion"; and that they practiced specific mathematical language games, even though they maintained family resemblance with those that constitute school mathematics.