Causo is not a lie: processes of territorial formation and sociabilities in the south of Minas Gerais.

• Grant number: 25/04383-9
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• Start date: August 01, 2025
• End date: July 31, 2029
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Anthropology - Rural Anthropology
• Principal Investigator: Nashieli Cecilia Rangel Loera
• Grantee: Lidia Maria Reis Torres
• Host Institution: Instituto de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas (IFCH). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The proposed project aims to investigate the importance of oral narratives, locally known as causos, as instruments of collective memory and discursive records that shape identity and social understanding in Cabo Verde, Minas Gerais. According to researchers, the Indigenous and Quilombola presence in the city has been structurally silenced over time. Inspired by ethnographic studies that explore oral narratives as a methodological tool, this project uses causos to map social relations, power disputes, and the socioterritorial formations of the city. The research seeks to mobilize diverse analytical materials, such as the collection and analysis of oral narratives, historical documents, books of tales, poems, and other texts related to the history of Cabo Verde, in conjunction with the analysis of narratives. The analysis aims to examine social relations across two temporalities: from the perspective of a memory of an erased past, and from the perspective of the present and the social relations and formations that causos activate in the daily life of the city. (AU)