Política & Sociedade (Jun 2017)
Nationalism and diversity: the Esquenta and the Opening Ceremony of the Rio 2016 Olympics
Abstract
The article seeks to present an analysis about the current forms of articulation between nationalism and diversity in Brazilian culture, taking as objects Esquenta!, a TV program from Globo TV, and the Opening Ceremony of the 2016 Rio Olympic Games. They both have in common an alternation between moments of unity and fragmentation which indicate the impasses and the solutions found to speak about “Brazil” in a political and cultural context of criticism to the assimilation of the “other” by the dominant discourse. The participation of Regina Casé in the ceremony is much more than casual. Casé has been in the spotlight for years. She is a TV personality. At the same time that she is seen as the “ambassador of the periphery on TV”, she is an important link in the network of artists and intellectuals who emerged on the Brazilian cultural scene from the 1980s, in theater, Video, Cinema and Television shows. The directors of the opening ceremony are also part of the first generation of artists and intellectuals formed after the consolidation of a cultural industry in Brazil, which had repercussions on their path and which TV and advertising were important spaces for professional socialization. In this same way, starting in 1980, they were influenced by the criticism of nationalism for its association with the Military Regime and by the increasing value given to diversity. In this analytical approach, we start by examining the Núcleo Guel Arraes (from Globo TV), a meeting place for many artists of this generation, all the way until the arrival of the Esquenta! program, as the definitive expression of the value of diversity through an aesthetic-political project of visibility of the periphery. Furthermore, this paper identifies echoes of this project at the opening ceremony, trying to demonstrate that the ceremony also outlined a similar solution in order to achieve conciliation between the problem of national identity and the value of diversity.
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