The Gender Gap Reversal in the Brazilian Education in the 20th Century

Jose Eustáquio Diniz Alves, Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística (IBGE)
Kaizo Beltrao, Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística (IBGE)

The reduction of the gender gap and the greater access to education among women are the explicit objectives of most international conferences promoted by United Nations in the last 10 years. Traditionally, in the majority of countries women always have more difficulties in the access to education. Some countries have achieved eliminating educational disparities in gender, but many others still have a large battle ahead. The gender gap and women educational deficit were the Brazilian reality along more than 450 years. Nonetheless, women have eradicated and reverted this gap in the second half of the XX Century. This paper has the purpose of analyzing how and when the reversal of gender gap in education took place in Brazil, examining demographic censuses data from 1960 to 1996, by schooling and educational degrees, broken down by sex and birth cohorts, from 1890 to 1990.