The commitment and the essay: the political and the politic in the First Brazilian Republic

Abstract

Some of the possibilities within the following essays will be approached in this article: O colono preto como fator da civilização brasileira (1918) by Manuel Querino and O Brasil na História: deturpação das tradições, degradação política (1930) by Manoel Bomfim. The hypotheses are as follows: 1) from the perspectives of Pierre Rosanvallon, it is pointed out that, even though not acting in the state administration (the politics), both authors were intensely engaged in reflecting and debating about the possibilities of action in their daily lives (the political); 2) For both authors, historical knowledge was central to the production of this committed knowledge to the issues of their contemporaneity.