Identificação e Caracterização dos Lugares de Memória Institucionais das Universidades Federais Brasileiras

The study discussed the of in the Brazilian university context, configured as important agents of knowledge organization. They safeguard institutional memory by acting in the production, preservation, transmission and reproduction of culture. spaces and knowledge generation, Archives, Libraries, Museums, centers, Documentation Centers and related spaces act as producers and collaborators in research, teaching and extension activities, intensifying the scientific, technological and cultural development of the university. In this context the research question is presented: How have Brazilian higher education institutions named and organized their institutional Places? The objectives of this study were: 1) to identify and describe the institutionalized in Brazilian Federal Universities; 2) Diagnose at the Federal University of Sao Carlos (UFSCar), located in the city of Sao Carlos, Sao Paulo, Brazil, how the Places of Memory are structured in this institution. Methodologically in order to meet objective 1), an exploratory research was developed based on a documentary survey of the institutional sites of 20 Brazilian Public University, in the Southeastern region (Espirito Santo, Minas Gerais, Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo), which concentrate the highest index national scientific production. To achieve objective 2) a partial case study was developed, together with UFSCar, considering that the university is located in the city with the highest number of doctors per inhabitant in the country. It is worth mentioning that there are many invisible memory spaces in this institution (that is, private libraries of teachers, special collections allocated in laboratories, among others) that were not the object of this investigation at this time. The accomplishment of the research tries, complementarily, to offer subsidies to the University (UFSCar), from experiences developed in other institutions on the safeguard of its memory and how this can contribute to the strengthening of a more cohesive and innovative university. From the results obtained it was possible to recognize that the universities of the Southeast region have physical spaces for the preservation and preservation of their memory, but they need to strengthen their actions and expand their spaces inside and outside the university (the 20 universities have 170 places of memory, mostly concentrated in the state of Minas Gerais and Rio de Janeiro). Thinking about memory raises the question of how to safeguard it, and in this sense, as regards the case study at UFSCar, it is understood that this university does not present many places destined to the memory and organization of knowledge (it has altogether 9 places of memory ), however, it makes efforts to create and maintain such spaces and policies for protection and organization, as is the case of the Multidisciplinary and Historical Archives Unit (UMMA), created by UFSCar in 2017, and also in structuring, which will work with the documents, spaces and aspects related to the memory of the institution. It is believed that it is a current tendency to concern with the organization of knowledge linked to memory, since institutions are realizing the importance of knowing their trajectory, understanding their ways, better guiding their decisions and predicting their future.