Human rights have been the subject of intense reflection, especially in the last decade, by a wide variety of researchers and intellectuals from different disciplinary areas. This text is an attempt to give some meaning to this production, focusing on Brazil and in international English language literature (United States/Canada), seeking to distinguish socio-historical literature from normative literature, both legal and political-philosophical. We paid special attention to works that proposed to reflect on the very object of human rights, as an empirical phenomenon to be observed.