Os movimentos festivos em prol da Abolição em Pernambuco (1884-1889)

Abstract

The abolitionist movement in the Brazil Empire was present in several provinces, including Pernambuco. Technological advances of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, such as the telegraph, contributed to the greater sharing of ideas, such as the end of slavery. The members of these organizations that sought to abolish slavery, propagated their ideals of freedom through practices that occupied the public space. The formal institutions of the Empire, such as the Parliament, were places for the few, especially literate men. In this way, the abolitionist movement made use of the street and the theater, for example, to secure the adhesion of the largest number of people. Men and women, literate or not, free or enslaved, people of different socio-economic and intellectual conditions participated in conferences, meetings, reading new newspapers and performing plays, whose theme was the abolitionist struggle. We seek to understand how the abolitionist ideal was propagated from the festive practices, which we call Abolition Feasts, and how they determined the construction of memories related to the end of captivity. In carrying out this dissertation, we found that the press had great relevance in the propagation of abolitionist thinking and, thus, we chose the newspapers Diario de Pernambuco and Jornal do Recife as our sources of work. Like the intellectuals Marlyse Meyer, Maria Lucia Montes and Maria Clementina da Cunha, among others, we also understand the party as an inversion ritual of a certain pre-established order. Furthermore, relying on Thompson, we understand that parties are a field of permanence and ruptures, which includes exchanges and conflicts.