Discursive practices on social relations among female couples with age differences

Abstract

This study investigates the discursive practices regulating the social life of female couples with a significant age difference in Brazil. Using Michel Foucault's discourse analysis, the research examines how heteronormative norms and age-based prejudices act as power devices, producing surveillance, judgment, and attempts to frame these relationships. Based on interviews with four couples, it was found that family, friends, and society in general mobilize discourses that range from invisibility and delegitimization to the pathologization of the bond. In response, the partners develop strategies of resistance, self-care, and subjective reinvention, transforming love into an ethical practice of freedom that challenges hegemonic norms of gender, sexuality, and temporality.