Da impossibilidade e aprender com o passado: sentimento, comércio e escrita da história na História do Brasil de John Armitage

Abstract

This master's dissertation studies the History of Brazil written in 1836 by an English merchant called John Armitage and its interchange with the shaping of Brazilian historiography in the first decades of nineteenth century. The main goals are the study of rupture's sensation between past and present which can be found in this book, as well as the impact in the enlargement of the historical object and in the foundation of a new narrative form which could organize the Brazilian national identity. We believe that these phenomena are related with a general process of time acceleration and of enlargement of the public realm which have happened in the Occident since the middle of eighteenth century. These processes are central to the Brazil political independence. On the history of historiography, these processes have had effect mainly in the refusal of imitation as criterion of historical analyses and in the emergence of a new kind of narrative, the sentimental one. Besides that, the language of commercial humanism has happened and consolidated with the commerce as a medium by which could be possible accomplish the refinement of passions in manners. To sum up, the main goal of this thesis is, on the one hand, to discuss these transformations, as well as present the historiographycal proposal of John Armitage based on narrative incorporation of values of a commercial and polite society and, on the other hand, evidence how this proposal might has been refused, or ignored, by eighteenth century Brazilian historiography.

Memória, historiografia e política: a independência do Brasil, 200 anos depois

“…Qualificou-a como uma revolução liberal positiva e adequada para o momento, pautada pela destruição de práticas políticas atrasadas e absolutistas que os "portugueses" haviam deixado como herança. Nesse sentido, em sua narrativa a expressão "independência" não estava associada apenas à separação de Portugal, mas apontava, sobretudo, para a ruptura que a construção de um governo liberal simbolizava do ponto de vista da quebra de tradições legadas pela colonização e da promessa de um futuro de "civilização", representado pelo ingresso do Brasil no mundo do livre comércio em conjunto com as demais nações ocidentais (Varella, 2011;Marson, 2009).…”