Introduction

Over the last five years, our research group⁴ has been developing a project on Clandestine Education (SILVEIRA; ^{MORETTI; PEREIRA, 2019a}, 2019b). Initially, the investigation received funds from the Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul[Research Support Foundation of Rio Grande do Sul] (Fapergs/Brazil) and, later, from the Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico[National Council for Scientific and Technological Development] (CNPq/Brazil), through the First Projects Program, which was valid from 2015 to 2019. Comprising the subarea of History of Education, one of the main objectives of the project was to explain the nature of educational practices developed by Brazilian communists and how they occurred during the period of clandestinity, especially throughout the second half of the 20th century.

The project was conducted taking into consideration the need to understand the forms, mechanisms and functions of education for communists in the context that connects the 1950s decade to the period when Brazil’s military dictatorship occurred (1964-1985). However, it also allowed an enlargement of analysis on histories and memories of educational practices in different clandestine regimes, as well as aspects related to the multiple dimensions of clandestinity in education. Education and clandestinity are the core of this research proposal. Along its implementation it was realized that a theoretical intersection with the concept of political cultures was needed, particularly on the cultures in which educational practices took place in or for clandestinity, which represented an essential element in terms of political culture for Brazilian communists in the second half of the 20th century. A variety of research sources were used, leading to a certain novelty in the History of Education field, since they integrated police inquiries and other documents produced by the repression organs that represented Brazil’s military dictatorship.

In order to understand the modes, mechanisms and functions of education for communists within the analyzed time frame - which includes different moments of a context in which Brazilian communists acted in clandestinity - we worked with inquiries, dossiers, records, reports and informs by political police operations where behaviors and practices of those who were considered "subversive" were registered in details (^{SILVEIRA; MORETTI, 2017}; ^{OLIVEIRA; SILVEIRA, 2017}). Specifically with regard to using this type of source - which refers to repressive contexts -, we also work with autobiographies and memoirs of travels to the Soviet Union taken by Brazilian communists. The travels provided information for the identification of an international clandestine education network guided according to the organization purposes of the proletariat in view of a world revolution.

Largely associated with the context of diversification of themes and sources for the History of Education, already identified by ^{Catani and Faria Filho (2002}) and working with sources from contexts marked by political repression (^{BRAGGIO; FIUZA, 2013}), the investigation required us to search for possible intersections involving three fundamental concepts for handling our sources: education, clandestinity and political cultures.

Throughout the process, different educational practices were identified as well as their possible relations with communist political culture during the Cold War, leading to a significant extension concerning the debate on Clandestine Education through interaction with researchers from different countries. Hence, there was an enlargement onto the investigated scope allied to the perception upon the term's potential considering various research topics in Human and Social Sciences. This proposal, which has evidenced multiple approaches involving education and clandestinity, resulted in two books: “Educação e clandestinidade” (SILVEIRA; ^{MORETTI; PEREIRA, 2019a}) and “Educação e culturas políticas” (^{SILVEIRA; MORETTI; PEREIRA, 2019b}), by the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul (Edipucrs/Brazil). Both volumes of “Educação Clandestina”⁵, evidenced that what was initially called Clandestine Education, from the imposition of specific research challenges regarding the education of Brazilian communists who lived in clandestinity during Cold War, ended up exceeding both, the study period and object, showing that the term could be an analytical category for different areas and aspects of formal and non-formal education (and, schooled and unschooled education) at different temporalities.

The central question that articulates the narrative in this paper is which concept of Clandestine Education emerges from the studies and approaches materialized in the productions linked to our research project and to our interinstitutional relations during the investigation. Based on the assumption that research in the History of Education is a “double sided coin”, which combines both the rigor of historical research and the reflection on educational realities (^{NÓVOA, 2011}, p. 9, our translation), further relevant questions are risen: what can Clandestine Education do? What are its constitutive dimensions and potential? Considering these questions, the paper aims to present some reference guidelines for the concept of Clandestine Education comprising its operationalization and contributions to the field of education.

Clandestine Education: the preamble of a concept

Discussing the preamble of the concept requires a return to the origin of this research. In order to understand educational practices developed by Brazilian communists in and for the clandestine context, it was necessary, from the very beginning, to be clear about the conceptions of education and clandestinity. Since then, references on notions associated with clandestinity have been searched in other researches that came close to the use and application that we thought in the field of Education. At that moment, there were no works using the specific term “Clandestine Education”. However, studies whose search term or topic contained only the word "clandestine" were found.

As previously mentioned, this research was conceived in the field of History of Education studies. Thus, it originally predicted analysis from different types of sources, such as official documents belonging to Brazil’s political police from the military dictatorship; communist newspapers; narratives of memoirs and autobiographies of militants and former militants who lived in clandestinity in Brazil and abroad. Each type of source required specific theoretical and methodological guidelines and, also, a constant review of the conceptions of education and clandestinity. Thus, these concepts were constantly updated throughout the research as a result of a practical investigation path. One of the main goals of this study was to associate the concepts of education and clandestinity with the combination of the most relevant historical-educational references found in the education literature.

In summary, the characterization related to the initial preamble of the concept showed that, following the object of study, which comprises communist educational practices in or for clandestinity, it was necessary to consider a theoretical-conceptual interaction between education, clandestinity and communist political culture. The investigation on education, clandestine and clandestine education led to an inflection of the concept of political cultures.

Answering the fundamental question about what education is, although not definitely, was one of the first efforts, being a constant concern throughout the course of the research, mainly due to the characterization of “clandestine” connected to “education”. Hence, the following question is related to the meaning of the terms clandestine or clandestiny, which are both considered as polysemic words. Regarding education, for example, the study considered broadened meanings and not restricted only to formal (and schooled) education, since educational practices among communists were not attached neither to the State structures nor to formal education systems.

Certainly, there is no "a single form or a single education model" and the "school is not the only space where it takes place and it may not even be the best". “School education is not the only practice and the professional teacher is not the only practitioner” (^{BRANDÃO, 2002}, p. 9, our translation). Education, as a "polyhedron with its many sides", can express many different and varied meanings (^{CABANAS, 2002}, p. 52, our translation). Thus, the following premises guided this study: I) education is a social practice operating towards two main directions: “towards the development of its productive forces and towards the development of its cultural values” (^{BRANDÃO, 2002}, p. 75); II) "education always expresses a pedagogical doctrine, which, implicitly or explicitly, is based on a philosophy of life, and on a conception of man and society"; III) “in a concrete social reality, educational process takes place through specific institutions that become representative for this doctrine” (^{FREITAG, 1986}, p. 13, our translation).

As for clandestine or clandestine status, a variety of possibilities and discussions can be found in a quick dictionary search, such as “something done on the sly”, “something that does not have conditions for publicity/visibility prescribed by law”, “hidden”, “illicit”, “ illegal ”, it was necessary to go beyond these general meanings, following the contributions found in historiography.

The historian Mozart Lacerda Filho (²⁰¹¹) developed significant considerations in his studies on the experience of clandestinity of left wing former-militants during Brazil’s military dictatorship: analyzing clandestinity requires “a polyphonic interpretation”, which includes even “psychoanalytic concepts”, such as “trauma, sublimation, resistance”. According to this historian, in addition to illegality and invisibility, clandestinity can also represent “project and imposition” (^{LACERDA FILHO, 2011}, p. 9, our translation). In this sense, being clandestine or living in clandestinity did not represent “a complete rupture with society”, but it was a “relative isolation” or “a situation where two antagonistic conditions coexist simultaneously: visibility and invisibility” (^{LACERDA FILHO, 2011}, p. 29, our translation).

Another significant contribution produced in the historiographic scope in Brazil was the study by Carolina ^{Scarpelli (2009}) on the marks of clandestinity in memories of the Brazilian military dictatorship. Scarpelli asserted that, "clandestinity interfered and still interferes in the subjectivity of the individuals who experienced it". Thus, the experience of clandestinity “is very heterogeneous, lived due to a series of singularities, ranging from personality traits of each individual to the specific circumstances of the time” (^{SCARPELLI, 2009}, p. 9, our translation). Therefore, researching about or from clandestinity, according to the historian’s observations, may contribute to include multiple subjects who are part of a social memory, unveiling and problematizing the silence and forgetfulness.

Although clandestinity was initially associated to the illegality imposed on Brazilian communist parties, it could not be restricted to this notion only. According to our perspective, the concept of clandestinity represents needs for individual and collective experiences which are interconnected for sharing group identities and developing collective projects of the future when communist education would be placed, not only as resistance, but as a project and a boost for mobilization and production of meaning in terms of political culture.

Political culture is a central idea to understanding the links between education and clandestinity as well as the concept of clandestine education itself. Considered as a multidisciplinary concept, according to the anthropologists Leandro Piquet Carneiro and Karina ^{Kuschnir (1999}), political culture is combined with different study fields, such as Anthropology, Psychology, Sociology and History. The concept first appeared in the United States. Gabriel Almond and Sidney Verba in a book called “The Civic Culture” (¹⁹⁶³) were the first authors to explore the concept systematically. Initially, it can be said that it was associated with the North American culturalist model, whose main “objective” was “to establish interrelations between culture and political structure, as well as its evaluations of Latin American political culture”⁶. In short, one of the interpretation models was the United States superiority and its civic culture over other possible options available. A few decades later, this perspective was severely criticized, mainly in political science studies. In spite of this, in summary, it can be affirmed that studies on political culture have a certain tradition that emerged from the North American culturalist model. In other words, "they reject the explanations derived from theories of rational choice for political phenomena, privileging the sphere of values ​​and the perception and assessment subjectified by individuals regarding the phenomena". They also consider that each individual, when participating in different “types of institutions (family, class, association, political parties, educational system, etc.), would be exposed to different forms of socialization that may be congruent or not with each other” (CARNEIRO; ^{KUSCHNIR, 1999}, p. 229-242, our translation).

Historians started using the concept of political culture in the 1960s. Bernard Bailyn in his book The ideological Origins of the American Revolution[“As origens ideológicas da Revolução Americana”] (1967) defended the thesis that “an Anglo-American political culture” was the root of political colonialist rebellion which “built the new nation” (^{MOTTA, 2014}, p. 17, our translation). However, in later decades, 1980-1990s, French historians took the discussion on political culture, starting by criticizing the American culturalist model from at least two aspects: they rejected explanations about any idea of democratic superiority between countries, especially the United States and Europe; they considered that an idea of ​​“national perspective” was excessively “generalist by attributing to entire nation the same political culture characteristics” (^{MOTTA, 2014}, p. 20, our translation). An example of specific understanding about political culture can be found in “The political culture” by Serge Bersntein a book organized by Jean François Sirinelli and Jean Pierre Rioux (1988). In Brazil, discussions on political culture were strongly influenced by French historiography, which has proved to be very fertile for analyzing political contexts from the perspective of “the strength of feelings[...], fidelity to traditions[...] and adherence to values ​​[...]” (^{MOTTA, 2014}, p. 29, our translation). Therefore, despite concrete criticism towards the culturalist model, the idea of subjective dimension in politics has been a permanent tonic. Pursuing the purposes of the present study, the concept of political culture is understood in a broad way. On the other hand, the concept of communist political culture is considered particularly.

Political cultures are not closed realities, which means that they are influenced by different contexts over the time. Social aspects should be considered, since they favor the reproduction of practices, actions and values shared by a determined group that are responsible for their own existence and reproduction. Moreover, Political Culture cannot simply be enclosed into party organizations. It is a polysemic concept, which can be understood as “a set of values, traditions, practices and political representations” that “shared by a specific human group, expressing collective identity and providing common readings of the past” also inspires “political projects for the future ” (^{MOTTA, 2013}, p. 17-18, our translation).

Discussing how the concepts of education, clandestinity and political cultures interact has become significant in order to understand the meanings of education practices among communists who lived in clandestinity. In other words, their group identity was not simply associated with the fact that communist parties were illegal. Illegality was a triggering factor, generating experiences converted into clandestinity as a remarkable feature present in the trajectory of men and women who had communists’ ideals throughout the 20th century. In this sense, from this context emerged educational practices that we call “clandestine”, since they are both the product and the fundamental support for communist political culture and communist education in and for clandestinity.

In order to introduce the discussion on communist education into the History of Education field, it was necessary to understand it, initially, as a non-formal or non-school education. However, significant differences can be highlighted when discussing communist education from the clandestine perspective.

Likewise, in Brazil, researchers, despite not expressing exactly the same senses about non-formal education, have been argued that it is an education “outside school spaces” and it “aims to develop the teaching-learning in a way not so much explored in formal education” (^{ALMEIDA, 2014}, p. 4, our translation). Observing this generic view around the idea of an “educational modality”, other researchers have recognized that studies on non-formal education are still in development, and this argument is in consonance with authors outside Brazil. Maria da Glória ^{Gohn (2006}), for example, considers that it is “a field of knowledge under construction”. According to her, non-formal education is generally associated with aspects related to “collective actions” and “community organizations”. Thus, it is understood as a type of education attached to the idea of a “social pedagogy” for “the solution of collective problems” and through which groups could obtain “an understanding of the world”.

In fact, many similarities between communist education and non-formal education can be pointed out regarding collective and social dimensions. Communist education, from the perspective of communist political culture, is also constituted from a set of shared elements that express “collective identity” (^{MOTTA, 2013}, p. 17, our translation). However, when education is conceived in its broad sense, that is as “social practice” (^{BRANDÃO, 2002}, p. 75, our translation) a collective or even social dimension is an essential conceptualization. Thus, not being a distinctive feature from non-formal education, it cannot be distinctive from concept of Clandestine Education, either, Although we considered it as a non-formal education, along the course of the research, other elements, aspects and characteristics that go beyond this concept were included. Despite carrying features of non-formal education, clandestine education integrates other specific matters.

Assuming the association of communist education with cultural elements related to communism, it can be presumed that its clandestine condition added another element for collective identification, a value, a common feeling to be shared that imposed a restriction, but mobilized a type of organization, less expressed as a modality of education and more directed to certain practices inserted in a specific political culture, the communist political culture. Thus, the strength of Communists' Clandestine Education was not in the fact that it was considered a non-formal education. Instead, its central characteristics were reflected in its practices and its function within a political culture conditioned by clandestinity under a context of strong repression that influenced communist political culture. Therefore, the education practiced by its supporters should be considered as a power in terms of mobilization and support for their political culture. Although non-formal education may contrast with the official educational terms, it is not necessarily a Clandestine Education. Accordingly, based on the themes and approaches brought by researchers who participated in the work Educação Clandestina, it is assumed that non-formal education is only one of the traits or characteristics of communist education. Furthermore, Clandestine Education does not only concern non-formal educational practices. Some research analysis will be presented to elucidate our theorical proposal and its constitutive dimensions.

Clandestine Education: conceptual notes

The first example is in the text Não há dois sem três: regimes de clandestinidade e processos educativos[There are no two without three: clandestine regimes and educational processes] by Fernando ^{Seffner (2019}). The paper, was part of the first volume o “Educação Clandestina”, and put the concepts of education and clandestinity together into dialogue, adding the idea of “clandestine regimes”, which is based on the premise that, through the same education, subjects can experience different clandestine regimes. Seffner studied school trajectories of HIV-positive men and women and he points out that “clandestine is, in this case, someone in silence, who cannot dialogue with others about the facts that pushes him/her to clandestinity” (^{SEFFNER, 2019}, p. 38, our translation).

The notions applied to the idea of “clandestine regimes” can be connected to temporality, considering the coexistence of different experiences of clandestinity, which can vary according to the marks of stigma and discrimination that affect realities, subjects and their subjectivities.

Fernando ^{Seffner (2019}, p. 38, our translation) when referring to the term clandestine, notes that it is commonly thought as "something outside legality, with a tendency to be done 'on the sly' '. However, as the author points out, "what is illegal is not always exactly illegitimate". An experience of clandestinity that would emerge associated with silence mark: “[...] someone who is in silence, who cannot talk to others about what pushes him/her into clandestinity[...] the difference that they[people] are carriers do not become a matter for debate” (^{SEFFNER, 2019}, p. 38, our translation). When analyzing the trajectory of HIV-positive students and teachers, Seffner refers to the current Brazilian context in which AIDS is once again “object of stigma and discrimination” that occurs as a consequence of “moral panic” experienced by a significant part of “Brazilian society in terms of gender and sexuality, from which, as an example, emerged movements such as 'School without a Party⁷´ and those who those who defend that gender and sexuality should not be in school curricula ”, this group is called“ movement against gender ideology”. According to this author, some aspects must be considered in order understand what he designated as “the extent of clandestine areas”.

It is clear that the greater or lesser extent of clandestine areas is related to the political regime in the country or region. In a strongly authoritarian regime, a dictatorship, for example, many activities are "pushed" to clandestinity, as well as political opinions, manners of expression, affiliation with political ideas, authors and books, cultural values, moral and ethical codes, etc. A broad democratic pluralism regime allows greater public cultural expression in terms of cultural, political, religious and moral diversity, which reduces clandestinity. When the political regime is strongly democratic and admits the pluralism of ideas, people are allowed to disagree in public with others. There is freedom for public expression and there is no need for living in clandestinity, since cultural difference is respected. When the regime is extremely closed and opposed opinions are criminalized, it generates areas with ​​clandestine individuals and organizations as well as a set of practices, debates and values ​​that can only be expressed in clandestinity (^{SEFFNER, 2019}, p. 39, our translation).

^{Seffner (2019}) approaches the dimensions of clandestine and clandestinity in relation to the “political regime” and its respective extent, greater or lesser, regarding democracy. Areas of clandestinity are directly influenced by the level of democracy found in the regimes. The current government, elected in 2018, for example, seems to have assumed the propositions of School without Party, “whose ideology was made public through a website and, at the same time, was stablished on the legal environment and ‘launched its tentacles’ inside schools in search of alleged indoctrinating teachers” (RAMOS, 2018, p. 7, our translation). Considering this, two important aspects can be inferred as relevant for the concept of Clandestine Education.

The first aspect is the relationship established between clandestinity and political context. Although there is not necessarily a specific reference regarding the concept of political culture, it is possible to reason this category as a possibility to understand the “extend of the clandestine areas”, since the researcher works from the perspective of intensity about the conditions of being clandestine and not precisely about political regime. The decrease or the “extent of clandestine areas” is associated, in this sense, to a social and political dimension, referred through values, beliefs, symbols and representations about gender and sexuality, as well as a diversity of structures build experiences of inequality and exclusion in specific political contexts.

Bringing the discussion into school education, based on what ^{Seffner (2019}) argues, the Brazilian society presents a current context in which, “gender and sexual orientation marks” that have significant implications, causing tension upon relationships between individuals and groups reflected inside the “school culture”, by demanding “adequate and respectful ways of teaching and living together”. AIDS, as a disease that affects mainly young population, LGBT, “poor people in general and without school access, can only be properly tackled if it is not relegated to the clandestine zone”. The answers that have been given on this topic in Brazil are moving away from “treatment and prevention measures through a widen reception for differences[...], diversity towards ways of experiencing gender and sexuality, and even ways of dealing with the disease”. Such distance is “connected with the decrease upon Brazilian democratic environment, a situation that has been experienced more intensely in recent years” (^{SEFFNER, 2019}, p. 53, our translation). In these clandestine areas into where HIV-positive people are pushed, there are educational practices sometimes configured as resistance, sometimes as projects, in a complex tension that involves visibility, invisibility and silence. From this example, the political dimension is elucidated in this study as one of the fundamental dimensions of Clandestine Education.

Political dimension is an important basis for the concept of Clandestine Education, firstly because it boosts intentions that enable possibilities of being for humans and society and, secondly, because it results from the relationship between educational practice and clandestinity that occur in specific cultures and political regimes, in which the experience of democracy is the condition for expansion or even reduction of clandestine regimes. Education and clandestinity, under this dimension, are less represented as a modality and more as an experience built upon a determined political and social context as well as upon the marks left on individual and collective subjects. This context may not necessarily be analyzed from a scenario of closing or repressing dictatorship, for instance, but from authoritarian surviving characteristics present even in democratic contexts. Relationships between these contexts and political culture can be stablished. The “school culture” may reflect contextual conditions so that the school may not impose an action over it, or, as in the case examined by the cited author, the school may not become a “welcoming place for debating sexually transmitted diseases, ways of experiencing affective and sexual life, discovering erogenous zones on the body, all these important processes in youth phase” (^{SEFFNER, 2019}, p. 54, our translation).

The second example, published in the second volume of “Educação Clandestina”, is the paper entitled Educação Comunista nas páginas do jornal A Classe Operária (1968-1970).[Communist Education in the pages of A Classe Operária newspaper (1968-1970)] (^{SILVEIRA et al., 2019c}). When analyzing A Classe Operária, which was the official newspaper of the two main communist parties in Brazil during the Cold War, Partido Comunista do Brasil (PCB)[Brazilian Communist Party] and Partido Comunista do Brasil (PCdoB)[Communist Party from Brazil], the authors claim that is was an important medium of education in that political culture, which in different ways, aimed at educating and politically mobilizing the working class. According to SILVEIRA et al. (2019c), the newspaper, as an official organ from the communist party, was valued among the militants and engaged functions related to communist education. In theoretical terms, the political dimension and, particularly, the concept of political culture, were used as an approach for analyzing Clandestine Education practice conducted or materialized in the newspaper. The paper is important because it shows another communist education channel, in addition to political training courses and militancy practices: the newspaper.

One of the most remarkable elements of communist political culture - the anti-revisionism - is prominent in the analyzed edition. The newspaper, as an element of communist education, not only “indicate what should be read and considered as politically and ideologically correct”; but also demonstrated “authors and texts that carried ideological positions or political theses considered to be divergent from the party leadership”, which means theses understood as “revisionist” (^{SILVEIRA, et al., 2019c}, p. 74, our translation). The study about A Classe Operária evidenced that the communist newspapers were conceived as a way of disseminating ideals that comprised the communist political culture and also, as a space and instrument of education, especially during periods of clandestinity.

In both examples, the authors mobilized different forms of relationship between education and clandestinity. The first example studies this interaction within the school environment and shows that clandestinity in education is not always previously related to non-formal education. On the other hand, in both studies, the political dimension of the context structured and produced the relationships established by the authors. In the first case, culture and a political regime that is little or less democratic and inclusive relegate the theme of AIDS and the existence of HIV positive people in schools to illegal clandestine systems, due to a context that favors silence and taboo for topics such as gender and sexuality. In the second case, lack of democracy also affects connections established by communists with clandestinity. This relationship expressed through educational practices aimed at safety due to the imminent repression, in addition to theoretical and ideological unity towards action and the project of revolution. Thus, A Classe Operária played an important role among educational alternatives created in clandestinity.

Returning to the books organized and published by our research group, Educação Clandestina, there are two other examples to be highlighted in this paper. In the first volume, the chapter entitled Discriminação: a passageira clandestina da pedagogia[Discrimination: the clandestine passenger in pedagogy], by François Dubet, the author states that “behind the school 'official' functioning and recognition of the role of social inequalities over the formation of educational inequalities, discrimination is presented as a 'clandestine passenger in pedagogy' ” (^{DUBET, 2019}, p. 17, our translation). When studying clandestine discrimination in society and inside the French education system, Dubet (2019) describes how discrimination and stigmatization operate in a subtle way in social practices, building and conditioning educational experiences.

Also in the first volume, two aspects can be highlighted from the studies by Douglas Luís ^{Weber and Camilo Darsie de Sousa (2019}): first, according to both authors, the clandestine dimension goes beyond legal concepts regarding the migrant's situation: “being clandestine does not refer to permanent visa”, but since “different migrants[...] are constituted in a context of 'clandestine life'[...], for occupying the position of other, as a displaced subject ” (^{WEBER; DARSIE, 2019}, p. 119-120, our translation); secondly, when referring illegal immigration, by exploring the concept of space, the authors explain that the “educational processes that migrants go through as a result of passing and / or staying in places other than those they left behind” contribute to take them into a “clandestine life”, which means in“ a subject position that permanently leaves them in a situation of strangeness with regard to native populations” (^{WEBER; DARSIE, 2019}, p. 126, our translation).

Cheron Zanini Moretti, in a chapter on the experience of Zapatista decolonial education, interrelated education and clandestinity with the concept of insurgency. The researcher explains that, claiming to be a product of the colonial historical process, o Exército Zapatista de Libertação Nacional (EZLN)[Zapatistista Army of National Liberation] and its support base of peasant and indigenous, not only created an Autonomous Rebellious Zapatista Educational System, but also experienced tensions among their resistance territories, in addition to other logics of times and spaces, as in the horizontal dialogue involving their own knowledge and methodologies faced with the hegemonic logic of world-system (colonial-capitalist-patriarchal). Moretti (2019a) concludes that: “against waste of experience, the Zapatism offers a variety of counter-hegemonic alternatives, most of them, generated in its army clandestinity and in its supporters” (^{MORETTI, 2019a}, p. 198, our translation). The author have studied the exile lived by Paulo Freire, observing the epistemological and pedagogical dimension of clandestinity concerning the Brazilian educator`s work and the clandestine permanence of his literacy method during the Brazilian military dictatorship (^{MORETTI, 2010}; ^{MORETTI; PITANO; SCHULZ, 2019b}).

Nevertheless, what do these examples tell us about the conceptual dimensions about Clandestine Education? First, clandestine educational practices can be generated under the circumstances of oppressive experiences lived by subjects, spaces, pedagogies, curricula and territories. From this perspective, clandestinity is experienced as a social practice not only by men and women, but through ideas, methods, systems, symbols and places. This experience, considering its formative dimension, can occur through resistance, exclusion or the pursuit of collective projects for the future.

Based on what has been exposed so far, and according to the considerations and interlocutions carried out and published in Brazil, Clandestine Education can be described as a set of heterogeneous social practices of formation, resistance and exclusion, resulting and producing less or more open or democratic political cultures. Created from a strategy or an imposition, these practices characterized by silence, clandestine regimes - distinct, complementary or overlapping - defined in the dialectic tension between freedom and oppression, being, therefore, individual and collective experiences of (in) visibility, (i) legality, and (in) equality.

Conclusion

Proposing reference guides for the concept of Clandestine Education in order to analyze its different operations and contributions was the main objective of this paper. In fact, this concept comprises different dimensions such as politics, epistemology, culture, history and education. Although not all these dimensions were explored with the same emphasis, the main theoretical elements were expressed and supported by the work developed in our research group. Accordingly, it is hoped that these considerations may support future works in the vast field of educational studies. In general, every theory, is generated from practice, thus, this paper describe the progress about our research path, emphasizing moments when challenges regarding theoretical and conceptual nature were imposed, impelling us not only to look for alternatives, but to debate, in group and with other interlocutors, about how and the best way to find the answers. Therefore, the first part of the paper is dedicated to report the studies developed in the last five years in two different moments: the first, reflecting on the theoretical and methodological aspects of interaction with the research sources; the second moment was based on theoretical-conceptual studies, which described dialogues about theoretical concepts that could ensure an accurate interaction concerning the procedures for the sources analysis. The conclusion from this initial part was that the challenges related to interaction with sources and methodological planning demanded a deeper analysis about the role of concept of political cultures for the research development. Being a multidisciplinary concept, the notions applied to it have improved the development of the study which was carried out in the period 2015-2019 and currently follows. Understanding communist education practices properly without considering the general concept of political cultures and the communist political culture, was clearly impossible. Therefore, when debating about the sources the concepts of education and clandestine, it was needed to understand the meaning of being clandestine and what was the relation between communist educational practices and clandestinity.

Leading to the second part, the discussion was about properly conceptual dimensions associated with the interaction between education, clandestinity and political cultures based on the research sources. It is important to underline the differences established connecting the concepts of non-formal education, communist education and clandestine education. Although communist education, as one of the expressions of what we call Clandestine Education, presents characteristics of non-formal education, it cannot be reduced to this notion. Non-formal education has aspects related to collectivity, to collective action, but these aspects are not enough to affirm that Clandestine Education, being an education developed upon group identity references, is considered uniquely as education- non-formal. The communist educational practices in clandestinity develop in a very specific context, which includes the illegality of communist parties, closure of democracy and repression.

As a category of analysis, the notion of Clandestine Education arose from the interaction between education concepts, clandestinity and political cultures. We noticed that the concept, unlike being related to one type or modality of education only, suggests a strong connection with social and political contexts. The political context that provides more or less scope to the “clandestine regimes” is one of their constitutive dimensions. Such dimension enables the exploration of different structures and practices that constitute the experience of inequality and exclusion in certain political contexts and their relationship with democracy.

Considering that different educational experiences are clandestine or in its direction, we can conceive the clandestine education as a category related to the experience constituted in a certain political and social context and in the marks left by this context over individual and collective subjects. As mentioned previously, Clandestine Education practices can be generated from the circumstances of oppression experienced by subjects, spaces, pedagogies, curricula and territories. Therefore, we argue that not only men and women live in clandestinity as a social practice, but also ideas, methods, systems, symbols and places. The formative dimension of this experience can emerge by the marks of resistance, exclusion or the search for collective projects for the future.

The case of communist education becomes just one type of education developed in clandestinity. There are other possibilities being explored, both in the present and in the past, both in formal and non-formal education. In all of them, clandestinity is less a legal and juridical situation and more a set of individual and collective experiences and practices imposed by a restriction context, but that end up stimulating the organization of clandestine groups or practices.

Finally, proposing a concept of Clandestine Education from the identification and analysis of its reference guidelines required a reflection on our research path and its challenges. This analysis was essential for defining theoretical and conceptual references. Social practices, training, resistance and exclusion. Strategy, imposition and silence. Clandestine regimes inserted within the tense and complex dynamics of individual and collective experiences that combine invisibility and visibility, legality and illegality, equality and inequality. Another important contribution to be mentioned is that researching on Clandestine Education from different perspectives wit History of Education brings originality to this study field in Brazil, where, in general, investigations explore themes related to history of educational institutions and school culture. Thus, the study of educational practices developed in clandestine regimes represents an important contribution to the field.