Escrever um sertão: memória e etnografia em Oswaldo Lamartine de Faria (1945-2005)

Abstract

This research focuses on the work of Oswaldo Lamartine de Faria (1919 – 2007), a renowned writer in the literate universe of Rio Grande do Norte, who between 1945 and 2005 dedicated himself to the study and writing about the rural world, especially the sertão do Seridó, building a work of varied textual genres and with significant autobiographical marks. The analysis of the discourse that operates in his essays and in the self writing, mainly in his interviews and published correspondence, allowed to undertake the examination of a certain conception about the sertão do Seridó built by him throughout the 20th century, privileging the ways in which in the text their experience with the time and space they put into practice are manifested. Thus, in the first chapter, we approach the existential assumptions that structure the historical knowledge effectively used by the sertanist in his reading of the sertão (RICOEUR, 2007). In the second chapter we dedicate ourselves to the analysis of the research and writing procedures that make up the ethnography put into practice by the author (CERTEAU, 1998). Finally, we consider that the sertanista makes deliberate use of the past to, in a questionable way, invest in the consolidation of a memory about a political domination over the sertão of Seridó.