Curricular Directives aim to organize courses and careers towards establishing professional identities. In this sense, the National Curricular Directives for Undergraduate Nursing Education define the foundations for the education of nurses in Brazil, pointing out the knowledge considered important for the profession. We base ourselves on the presuppositions found in Michel Foucault's work to carry out a textual analysis of the discourses conveyed by the Curricular Directives for Nursing, questioning them as a strategy to govern and subjectivize that acts upon the bodies of future nurses. The reflections herein point towards a document that can be seen as an instrument that intends to normalize students and constitute them to become nurses. Thus, the profile of a "good" and a "bad" professional is defined, normalizing bodies and attitudes, not allowing them to think and create another way and instituting a "regime of truth" that produces a certain type of nurse.
Nursing education; Discourse; Role of nursing professionals; Government