Health is here understood as a field of knowledge and social practices production, in which the efforts to better understand are meant to support better interventions over a broad life context. In this study the historical-political-conceptual bases of Collective Health in Brazil have been explored through a methodological approach in which the analytical categories emerge from the reflections produced by the field itself. Over a theoretical-conceptual database a critical analysis has been developed, mainly about the consequences of the official science impact in the field. Collective health is thus considered a knowledge field in constant change, built upon theory and social militant practices, in an effort to produce new paradigms to better understand and better take care of Brazilian people health.
Public Health; Knowledge field; Social learning; Practice