Liberdade em cena: teatro, humor e racismo no tempo da abolição e além (Salvador, Bahia, 1884-1906)

Abstract

The association between the process of eradicating slavery and the political use of theater, in the late nineteenth century, by abolitionist militants to debate Brazilian society, will be the fundamental center of this thesis. Starting from the premise that theater was an important space for political action and an environment of social imagination about the future of the country, I will analyze part of the dramaturgical production of engineer Sílio Boccanera Júnior and poet Alexandre Fernandes. Mixing light theater with moralizing inspiring humor, my main hypothesis is that the authors, along with other theater literati, took the politicization of theatrical space to the years after the Golden Law and the beginning of the Republic, in order to convince other sectors about the country's trajectory: education and art as a means of “civilizing” the “new” citizens. For this, the authors used humor and racial marking on stage, in various ways, as a weapon to defend their project on the future of the nation. However, the reactions of the audience went beyond expectations, pointing out how the polysemy of the performances, the complexity of the theatrical scene and the diversity of the audience, put different understandings on the social roles of the subjects represented and their contributions to the brazilian republic.