Luciana Murari

Um eugênico, enfim: o gaúcho como tipo antropológico na literatura e no discurso social brasileiro

This article analyses the gaucho as a social identity in Brazilian literature and political thought through the works of Jose de Alencar, Apolinario Porto Alegre, Euclides da Cunha, Alcides Maya, Roque Callage and, mainly, Oliveira Viana. The latter was one of the most important authoritarian theorists in Brazil from the 1920s to the 1940s, enthusiastically using the ethnic argument applied to Brazilian sociology. From the second half of the nineteenth century to the first half of the twentieth, regionalist literature contrasted the typical man from the extreme South of Brazil to other Brazilian and Hispanic people in order to affirm the superiority of the gaucho, and his supposed avant-garde role in national affairs. This idea reaches its zenith in Vianas sociology works.

The cerrado of Goiás in the literature of Bernardo Élis, from a viewpoint of environmental history

This article analyzes the representations of nature in the literature of Bernardo Élis based on the theoretical and methodological assumptions of environmental history. Élis was part of a group of intellectuals whose literature presented the living conditions in the frontier of Goiás and the human relationships occurring in these landscapes. In these scrublands, the dramas of their characters are mixed with the physical environment of the cerrado region in a realistic narrative denouncing the living conditions in this isolated frontier area. In their dialog with literature, the fundamentals of this field of historiographic research can be adopted as analytical instruments, combined with concepts related to the integration between society and nature, such as the frontier and wilderness.This article analyzes the representations of nature in the literature of Bernardo Elis based on the theoretical and methodological assumptions of environmental history. Elis was part of a group of intellectuals whose literature presented the living conditions in the frontier of Goias and the human relationships occurring in these landscapes. In these scrublands, the dramas of their characters are mixed with the physical environment of the cerrado region in a realistic narrative denouncing the living conditions in this isolated frontier area. In their dialog with literature, the fundamentals of this field of historiographic research can be adopted as analytical instruments, combined with concepts related to the integration between society and nature, such as the frontier and wilderness.

Um vazio em disputa, uma nação inconclusa

Review of: GONZALEZ GOMEZ, Lina Marcela. Un eden para Colombia al otro lado de la civilizacion . Los llanos de San Martin o Territorio del Meta, 1870-1930. Medellin: Universidad Nacional de Colombia, 2015. 515 p.

Paisagens noturnas: ficção, lenda e história nas narrativas sertanejas de Coelho Neto

Resumo : Este artigo analisa a ficcao sertaneja de Coelho Neto, buscando observar a formacao das convencoes tematicas e esteticas da literatura regionalista brasileira, a partir das imagens noturnas inseridas em sua prosa. O estudo considera que estas se difundem, na obra ficcional do escritor, segundo as perspectivas da descricao paisagistica e das narrativas sobrenaturais. Explorando o tema da paisagem, constatamos que o descritivismo e uma dimensao fundamental dos seus textos, sobretudo por definirem sensibilidades em relacao a natureza e evocarem a memoria sensorial do ambiente fisico. As narrativas sobrenaturais incorporam, por sua vez, alguns temas fundamentais de sua literatura rural: a sexualidade, a exploracao economica do territorio e a miscigenacao, temas convertidos em imagens da formacao do Brasil a partir da colonizacao escravista. Concluimos que, mesclando imaginacao e historia, o escritor criou uma representacao original da trajetoria da sociedade brasileira ao longo do tempo. Palavras-chave : Coelho Neto; paisagem; regionalismo literario; identidade nacional brasileira; sobrenatural. Abstract : This article analyses the backcountry fiction of Coelho Neto. It aims at identifying the formation of the thematic and aesthetic conventions of Brazilian regionalist literature through his prose’s nightly images. The study considers that such images are conveyed throughout the writer’s fictional production via landscape descriptions and supernatural narratives. The former is an essential dimension of his production since it defines a clear sensibility towards nature evoking sensory memories of the physical environment. On the other hand, the latter incorporates fundamental themes of his rural fiction - sexuality; economic exploitation of the territory and miscegenation – examining Brazil’s formation through images of colonization and slavery. In conclusion, the writer merged imagination and history and created a unique representation of the itinerary of Brazilian society over time. Keywords : Coelho Neto; landscape; brazilian literary regionalism; brazilian national identity; supernatural.

Água parada: o olhar da modernidade na ficção de Alcides Maya

This paper aims to analyze writings by Alcides Maya, focusing similarities between his fictional creation and political ideas conveyed by the press, even thought they can look radically opposed or contradictory. In dramatizing personal and social conflicts in the most traditional region of Rio Grande do Sul, the author expressed his concerns about its decadence, through the lenses of a modernization agenda.