Crossroads of Academic Cultures: The Trajectories and Experiences of Brazilian Intellectuals in France and England.

This communication aims to present the preliminary results of an ongoing research on the recruitment of Brazilian professors in European universities, particularly in France and England. While the traditional pattern of intellectual exchanges between Brazil and Europe once entailed training abroad followed by a return to Brazil, recent transformations in higher education - marked by a heightened emphasis on internationalization and diversity - have created new conditions for Brazilian researchers to access and to secure academic positions in Europe. However, this recruitment does not present the same aspects in every country, as the specificities of each national higher education system represent specific challenges in international academic mobility. Based on the analysis of the CVs of the Brazilians academic workforce in French and English universities and the interviews made with these faculty members, I ask in what extent is it truly possible for Brazilian researchers to be recruited both as representatives and informants of a culture and as an innovative and diverse force and how do these two perspectives converge or diverge depending on national contexts.

The primarily results shows that literature, in France, and economics, in England, are the two major fields of Phd production by Brazilian faculty members. Thus, the recruitment of Brazilians appears to occur, on one hand, due to their national specificities, and on the other hand, because of their integration into more internationalized fields, where geographical origin is less decisive for academic recruitment. Indeed, the thematic and intellectual choices allow them to present themselves as informants of their culture of origin abroad, while also playing the role of international representatives in their interactions with researchers from their home country. This dual status of expatriates highlights the complexity of their positioning in the international academic field, as they must constantly negotiate their identity and expertise.