Banca de DEFESA: Rodolfo Araújo dos Santos Junior

Uma banca de DEFESA de DOUTORADO foi cadastrada pelo programa.
STUDENT : Rodolfo Araújo dos Santos Junior
DATE: 03/10/2025
TIME: 08:30
LOCAL: ICS
TITLE:

The Representation of the Brazilian Rural World in the Countryside Comedies of Martins Pena

KEY WORDS:

Martins Pena; Vacillating Generation; rural world; sociology of culture; peasant

PAGES: 187
BIG AREA: Ciências Humanas
AREA: Sociologia
SUMMARY:

This dissertation examines the representations of the Brazilian rural world in the comedies of Martins Pena, situating his works within the social, cultural, and political context of the first half of the nineteenth century. It departs from the observation that, amidst processes of urban growth, the rise of the press, and the intensification of literate life, an ambivalent view of the countryside was consolidated: on the one hand, it was portrayed as a place of simplicity and authenticity, and on the other, as a space associated with backwardness and ignorance. This ambivalence is crucial to understanding the position of the rural universe in the broader disputes over national identity then underway. The main objective of the study is to analyze how these representations were elaborated and staged in Pena’s comedies of manners, emphasizing the comic strategies — laughter, satire, and caricature — used to construct social types that were easily recognizable to contemporary audiences. To that end, the research mobilizes a wide range of sources, including theatrical texts, periodicals, chronicles, novels, travelers’ accounts, and visual materials produced between 1831 and 1849, as well as specialized critical literature. Methodologically, the dissertation draws on the approaches of cultural history and the sociology of literature, with particular attention to the concept of the “picturesque,” a descriptive category inherited from European travelers and reworked by Pena in his rural farces. The analysis also highlights the playwright’s connections with the so-called hesitant generation, a group of journalists, writers, and artists whose networks of sociability helped introduce and consolidate the first paradigms of Romanticism in Brazil. The results demonstrate that Martins Pena’s theater functioned as a privileged space for the comic translation of conflicts between countryside and city, elites and popular groups, tradition and modernity. Although fragmentary and marked by a jocular tone, his plays reveal essential elements for the consolidation of a national comedy, while also providing critical reflections on the cultural, political, and social tensions of the time. It is therefore argued that the representation of the rural world in his oeuvre played a singular role in shaping a Brazilian cultural identity in formation.

COMMITTEE MEMBERS:
Presidente - 2273018 - EDUARDO DIMITROV
Interno - 1505195 - SERGIO BARREIRA DE FARIA TAVOLARO
Externo à Instituição - CAETANO ERNESTO PEREIRA DE ARAUJO - SENADO
Externa à Instituição - MARIA ANGELICA BRASIL GONCALVES MADEIRA - MRE
Externo à Instituição - Marcus Vinicius Gomes Caixeta - CAPES