"I PAY, I DON'T DENY. I LIVE WHEN I CAN": INDEBTEDNESS, PRECARIOUSNESS OF TEACHING LIFE AND NEOLIBERAL GOVERNMENTALITY

We present some findings of a research that aimed to know what are the subjective effects of indebtedness for state teachers in Rio Grande do Sul/Brazil. In this article, we focus on analyses and discussions concerning the production of teachers' indebtedness and the precariousness of their lives due to neoliberal rationality. The research work, whose methodology was a composition of an analysis of archeo-genealogical inspiration and the cartographic process, included interviews with eight teachers and analysis of reports from newspapers of large circulation, from the teachers' union, cartoons and reports on the Internet on the theme. Here we analyze the impacts of neoliberal governmentality in the condition and daily life of teachers considering the austerity policies conducted by state governments, the effects of public debt and the concept of neoliberal homo oeconomicus, addressed by Michel Foucault. The neoliberal logic structures the conduct of subjects as entrepreneurs of themselves, with emphasis on competition and individual accountability. We discussed the issue of debt as biopolitics, the implications of teachers' financial and moral indebtedness and the proletarianization of the profession, which led us to highlight a notion of precariousness not only corresponding to the low remuneration received by teaching professionals, but of life itself; in these circumstances, (mere) survival is normalized and credit for "life" is assured. We conclude by discussing the mutation of the popular saying that opens the title, in an attempt to link indebtedness and the precarization of life, an approach that we believe requires further study.