Sonhos de uma liberdade republicana, nas páginas do Jornal Verdade, Areia – PB (1888-1892).

Abstract

This dissertation analyzes the republican propaganda speeches in the newspaper Verdade, since its emergence (1888) til the first efects of republican government (1892). The locus of the research was the city of Areia, in the Brejo region of Paraíba State, a place of certain economic prosperity and urban development. In this context of cultural effervescence, the newspaper that started its activities from the abolitionist campaign in the city emerged. The newspaper's team included literate academic men such as Manuel da Silva (editor in chief), graduated in pharmacy at the Faculty of Medicine of Bahia, the bachelor and professor Francisco Xavier Jr. as a writer, the poet Rodolfo Pires as a typographer and the publicist as an external collaborator and lawyer from Areia city Dr. Jo o Coelho Lisboa. Another group was part of the newspaper's external team. Based on the newspaper's news, we searched for descriptions of public spaces such as the reading room, theater and debates on the city's public issues, using the methodology of discourse analysis and serial history based on Foucault (2014). Based on the characterization of the newspaper's staff and the social groups that participated, we started to analyze the main discursive formations defended by the newspaper. Ideologies such as positivism, liberalism and jacobinism merge with some ideas from the Spiritist religion, as proposals for political organization under the new republican regime. Although we dealt mainly with the literate culture of Areia in the late nineteenth century, we sought to understand how the newspaper saw the popular classes and how cultural practices permeated the entire society. When comparing the early years of the Republic with the dreams of freedom from the propaganda period, we saw that many of these dreams were frustrated by the installation of an oligarchic Republic.