Born in Brazil, she made aliyah to Israel to work communally on a kibbutz and earn her bachelor's and master's degree from the University of Haifa.
Returning to Brazil in 1976, she taught sociology and began incorporating women's studies into her work at the Federal University of Minas Gerais.
[3][9] For over a decade, she served on the Concurso de Dotações para Pesquisa sobre a Mulher e Relações de Gênero (Research Appropriations Commission on Women and Gender Relations) sponsored by the Carlos Chagas Foundation [pt], to promote academic research into the issues women faced in Brazilian society.
[3][10] She was one of the founders of Revista Estudos Feministas [pt] (Feminist Studies Magazine), one of the primary Brazilian academic journals on gender, in 1992, and has served on its editorial board.
[3] Along with veteran journalist Guila Flint, she wrote, Israel terra em transe: democracia ou teocracia?
), an analysis of Jewish fundamentalism and nationalism and its impact on tensions in the Middle East,[12] which was a finalist in the 2001 Prêmio Jabuti competition for human sciences.
She serves on the Comitê Gêneros e Sexualidades (Committee of Gender and Sexuality) of the Associação Nacional de Pós-Graduação e Pesquisa em Ciências Sociais (ANPOCS, National Association of Graduate Studies and Research in Social Sciences).
Among the list of theorists covered in the book were Anna J. Cooper, Ercilia Nogueira Cobra [pt], Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Alexandra Kollontai, Harriet Martineau, Pandita Ramabai, Olive Schreiner, and Alfonsina Storni, who were selected to represent each global geographic area.