CONSTRUÇÕES IDENTITÁRIAS ÀS MARGENS DO PARAGUAI: UMA ANÁLISE DA POESIA FRONTEIRIÇA DE BENEDITO C.G. LIMA E ÂNGELA MARIA PÉREZ

Abstract

This work aims to analyze the identity constructions of the "sendo fronterizo", inhabitant of the Brazil-Bolivia border, through the literature written by two Corumbá poets: Benedito C. G. Lima and Ângela Maria Pérez. The qualitative and interdisciplinary study analyzed the writings through the social lens of literature, based on Candido, Sapiro, and Ferguson. Understanding that the text’s social role is relevant to explaining its ideas and structure, the research aimed to understand the identity constructions that take place in the literature of those who inhabit this border. It sought to observe the presence of topics related to love of the land, social criticism, and ethnic mixing in the writings, as well as to investigate contrasts and similarities between the works and their socio-cultural scenario. The results illustrate a border identity construction characterized by contradiction and paradox, the in-between place about which the poet speaks and from which he speaks. The concept of “crioulidade” and Glissant's Poetics of Relation helped to understand the relational vision established by the poetic self, which always sees itself in relation to the Other and constructs itself discursively based on this relationship. Pérez’s diverse use of language, which she develops using Portunhol sometimes even Guarani, is an example of this vision, which is significant given the scarcity of Brazilian women writing in Portunhol. Based on Glissant concept, the concept of Post-War Poetics was conceived to encompass and explain, considering the effects of the Paraguayan War in this region, the fragmented, prejudiced, and hierarchical relationships that exist in Pérez and Lima's Corumbaense society, as well as the artists' quest to bring to light characters from the "anti-city". The analysis of the texts, the study of Portunhol, and the understanding of identity based on the Poetics of Relation led to a change in the concept of "ser fronteiriço" to "sendo fronteirizo", which intends to describe the environment of contradictions, cultural diversity, and linguistic contacts in which a mutable identity creation takes place, centered on contradiction, paradox, and relations. Keywords: Borders literature. Identity. Ethnicity.