This article analyzes the investigative foundation provided by Marx to his theoretical-methodological categories, that is, how to operate the relationship between ontology, gnosiological process and method in his work. It highlights that the appropriation of a Marxian approach to ontology and method in research in Social Work is necessary to deepen the critical and emancipatory perspective of the profession. Based on the category of praxis, it reveals the organic ties between the ontological and methodological determinations in the process of production of knowledge, which imply the refusal of a formal-abstract position. Finally, it indicates that the perspective of concrete totality and of historicity make unviable any speculative and formalist separation of the method in relation to the contradictions of social life.
Social Work; Práxis; Method; Cognoscitive process