XVII Congress of the Brazilian Studies Association

Skeptical Hope: Performing Beyond The Pink Tide and Neofascism in Brazil

Session Submission Type: Complete Panel

Abstract

Lula's victory over Bolsonaro in 2022 signaled a shift in Latin American politics, gesturing away from the alliance between radical neoliberalism and outspoken neofascism and back towards the neodevelopmentalist promises of the Pink Tide. Yet, given the high hopes engendered by the Pink Tide were squashed by the sudden rise of neofascism, how skeptical should we be of the prospects of progressivism in Brazil? This panel is part of an ongoing transdisciplinary and transnational research project that investigates the role of hope as critical praxis and methodology in and through performance throughout the Américas. In the past, Latin America has produced both its fair share of performance practices that envision and engender more livable and just futures, and countless examples of frustrated hopes. In its affirmative expression, hope seems inexhaustible in the ways it expands the limits for what is possible—like performance, hope ends and starts again.

For this panel, we explore the articulation of hope, skepticism, and performance for Brazil after Bolsonaro. Drawing from art and ethnic studies, law, musicology, theology and performance studies, the papers in this panel engage with practices as varied as indigenous activism, a Netflix documentary on hip-hop, legal theory, evangelical gospel music, and indigenous feminist performance. In doing so, performance serves simultaneously as a critical practice that reveals the roots of our skepticism, and as a praxis to experiment and live out hopeful alternatives to the pessimism of the past few years.

Sub Unit

• XVII Congress of the Brazilian Studies Association

Individual Presentations

• Last year I died, but this year I won’t: Breathing Brazilian black hope into global pandemics of COVID, racism, and neofascism - Marcos Davi Silva Steuernagel, The New School

• The right to bury the dead: ethics, aesthetics and justice - Marcus De Matos, Brunel University London

• Hope Right and Left: Performing Politics Through Christian Musicking in Brazil - Marcell Silva Steuernagel, Southern Methodist University

• “Os espíritos das minhas filhas”: Indigenous Art, Performance, and Feminist movements in Brazil - Patricia Gomes, UC Berkeley

Chair

• Marcos Davi Silva Steuernagel, The New School

Session Organizer

• Marcos Davi Silva Steuernagel, The New School