Mamulengos in contemporaneity: tradition X reinvention

• Grant number: 13/13750-8
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Post-Doctoral
• Start date: December 01, 2013
• End date: November 30, 2015
• Field of knowledge: Linguistics, Literature and Arts - Arts - Theatre
• Principal Investigator: Neyde de Castro Veneziano Monteiro
• Grantee: André Carrico
• Host Institution: Instituto de Artes (IA). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The presence of the mamulengo in the theater scene of the big cities, by theater companies migrants from Pernambuco, makes this kind of puppet theater no longer obey only the values of the tradition of its origin, the Zona da Mata. In the context of the metropolis, mamulengo will often deal with a field of heterogeneous discourses (media, cultural industry, urban culture) and the codes of the contemporary theater. This project aims to identify these interactions and convergences between popular theater and the contemporary scene by the analysis of three theater companies around São Paulo: Teatro de Bonecos de Valdec de Garanhuns, Mamulengos da Folia and Grupo Imaginário. Using the concepts of cultural interbreeding and urban culture (CANCLINI) we intend to investigate the limits between reinvention and convention in the traditional art of the mamulengo.