A category with latent meaning

the notion of “folk” in brazilian folklore Studies and Florestan Fernandes’s (critical) perspective

Abstract

As is well known, the sociologist Florestan Fernandes played a significant role in the field of folklore studies in Brazil, particularly through the fruitful debates he established with other intellectuals engaged in this area of knowledge production. In this regard, it can be said that Fernandes devoted a vigorous intellectual effort—although limited to a specific period of his academic career (between 1941 and 1962)—which greatly contributed to the debate on Brazilian folklore. Among the many aspects of Fernandes’s work concerning folklore, the notion of “folk” as addressed and problematized by the author, has not received the attention it deserves from scholars. Therefore, this article aims to contextualize and analyze how the category of “folk” is mobilized by Florestan Fernandes in the debates he engaged in with folklorists. To this end, the analysis draws on the anthology he published in 1978, O Folclore em Questão (Folklore in Question), which compiles texts he originally published in the press during the period he dedicated to the subject. The findings suggest that Fernandes’s critiques of the supposed formation of an autonomous field of folklore studies—raising questions about both its methods and objects—also touched on the inventive conception of “the people” that was under tension in those debates. Furthermore, it is concluded that Fernandes’s conception of “the people” helps us to better understand his commitment to defending folklore as a humanistic discipline.