Browsing by Subject "Bahia"
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Item The Aeneid of Brazil : Caramuru (1781)(2012-05) Mora García, Belinda; Arias, Arturo, 1950-; Lindstrom, Naomi; Roncador, Sonia; Arroyo, Jossianna; Canizares-Esguerra, JorgeThis dissertation concerns the epic poem Caramuru (1781) by José de Santa Rita Durão. I propose both a post-nationalist or postcolonial reading of Caramuru, as well as a pre-nationalist or historical analysis. The first part of this dissertation focuses on the form itself, particularly the genre of epic poetry to which Caramuru belongs. The title of this dissertation references Virgil’s Aeneid, while the comparisons between this and other epics focus on the conventions of epic poetry, placing Caramuru within the context of other epic poems. Traditionally, and even recently, Caramuru has consistently been compared to Luis de Camões’ Os Lusíadas. I have tried to establish a closer connection with Virgil’s Aeneid, rather than Os Lusíadas, as the model epic for Caramuru. Chapter One focuses on the topic of imitation, specifically the many similarities with the plot of Virgil’s Aeneid. Chapter Two offers a historiographical approach to how the readings of colonial texts changed over time, including a historical background of Caramuru, which was written soon after the fall of the so-called enlightened despotism of Portugal under the Marques de Pombal. The second part of this dissertation is a close reading of the text itself, and focuses on the colonial discourse present in the poem. Chapter Three is an analysis of the religious discourse in Caramuru, which reflects the preoccupations of an Augustinian monk living in the Age of Enlightenment. Chapter Four concerns the representations of Amerindian resistance in the poem, particularly of two characters who belong to the insubordinate Caeté tribe. The last chapter focuses on the issue of gender and how women are represented in Caramuru. The main woman protagonist is a Tupinambá woman who becomes a prototype for Iracema, a well-known fictional character from nineteenth-century Brazil. Santa Rita Durão was born in Brazil but lived most of his adult life in Portugal, plus 15 years in Italy. He wrote that the motivation to write this poem was his ‘love of homeland’ or nationalist sentiment, even though the nation of Brazil was yet to exist at the time he wrote Caramuru.Item Bagunçaço : music for social change in Salvador, Brazil(2012-12) Blake, Ashley Lauren; Straubhaar, Joseph D.; Wilkins, KarinThe legacy of colonialism has left an impression on Brazil that is still strongly present today, particularly in the city of Salvador, Bahia, and the connection between race and class remains quite conspicuous throughout Brazil in politics, business, and social settings. The 20th century saw the rise blocos afro as part of an Afro-Brazilian diaspora seeking pride in black identity and positive social change through concrete community-driven projects. This paper focuses on a newer community group, Bagunçaço, that follows in the footsteps of the blocos afro with an increased emphasis on the role of media in the social development process, using music paired with various digital technologies to educate, empower, and connect participants. The report is an ethnographic study based on first person interviews and observation by the author in Salvador, as well on as a biography on Bagunçaço’s founder, Joselito Crispim. The primary findings of the paper are 1) Bagunçaço serves to mitigate crime and violence among youth, providing kids with skill-building music, art, and technology activities to engage in during free time. 2) The group also serves a spiritual need of Afro-Brazilians by empowering kids with the context of their situation as part of a diasporic community that can resist oppression and gain upward social traction in a society permeated by historic racial hierarchy. 3) Bagunçaço transcends national lines with its international partnerships and engages in a digital exchange that is not only technology skill building, but an expansion of kids’ perspectives of the world beyond the poor communities that many of them would otherwise only ever know.Item Warriors of the classroom : liberatory teaching practices in low-income settings in Brazil(2014-05) Lisboa de Sousa, Andréia; Foster, Kevin Michael, 1969-; Urrieta, Luis; Jones, Omi Osun Joni L.; Valenzuela, Angela; Brown, Anthony L; Paixão, Marcelo; Rossatto, CesarThis study is based on Black female high school teachers’ experiences in Salvador, Bahia/Brazil, as they have adopted African Diasporic curricula and attempted to install counter-hegemonic teaching practices that empower Black and other low-income students. I draw on my experience as a working-class, Black female teacher and on extensive fieldwork with teachers who were recognized by their communities for their commitment to Black liberatory practices and educational activism. Their practices illuminate creative strategies to address issue of race, gender and class within curricula, teaching and classroom’s pedagogical practices. I argue that the educators of this study, although their voices still remain largely invisible within mainstream curricula design, shed light on the ways schooling settings become a “site” of racial scripts and alternative racial alterities. My research has been guided by a multipronged theoretical approach that includes: a) Critical Pedagogy; b) Critical Race Theory (CRT); c) Black Feminist Theory (specifically regarding Black women’s role in creating alternative forms of resistance to address curriculum materials); d) an African Diasporic framework that contextualizes the Brazilian curricula reforms within the global formations of race, class, gender and spirituality. This study is heavily ethnographic and includes a two-year field work in a predominately low-income school, named as Quilombo High. After six months of observation across campus, I worked with five Black female teachers in particular. I also interviewed students, and administrated a survey to students. Archival research helped to provide a historical context in which the curricula reform has been discussed and implemented. I studied the Ministry of Education and the State Department of Education policies designed to carry out the new curriculum legislation, as well as the political landscape in which it took place. This research is part of a larger project that aims to foster and give visibility to alternative pedagogical practices deployed by Black educators to counter hegemonic/white supremacist curricula. It is my contention that such counter-hegemonic practices not only to unveil the insidious system of domination embedded in schooling practices. More imperatively, it brings about a resignification of the classroom as a field of resistance and blackness as transformative pedagogy of activists’ educators across the African Diaspora.