Universit degli Studi di Firenze

Facolt di Scienze Politiche "C. Alfieri"

FINAL THESIS
MASTER IN

COMUNICAZIONE E MEDIA
CoMundus
European Master of Arts in Media Communication and Cultural Studies

BRAZILIAN IDENTITY
Media, identity and representational practices

Supervisor: Silvia Pezzoli

Candidate: Natalia Engler Prudencio

Academic Year 2010/2011

INDEX

Abstract................................................................................................................2
Introduction .........................................................................................................3
Research area ......................................................................................................6
Research questions ............................................................................................7
Theories................................................................................................................8
Identity, imagined communities and representation .........................................8
Theoretical accounts of Brazilian identity ......................................................18
Methods..............................................................................................................31
Sampling .........................................................................................................31
Analytical strategy ..........................................................................................33
Analysis ..............................................................................................................37
Discussion...........................................................................................................71
The New York Times......................................................................................71
Folha de S.Paulo..............................................................................................73
General results.................................................................................................75
Conclusion..........................................................................................................80
Original texts .....................................................................................................82
Bibliography ....................................................................................................117

ABSTRACT

This research aims at analyzing how the Brazilian identity is represented in foreign
and national news in order to uncover the patterns of representation, compare the
representational practices that emerge from the different sources and read it in the
light of theories about identity, representation and Brazilian culture. In order to do
that, a literature review of theories about identity construction, the process of
imagining communities, representation and Brazilian identity was realized and then
followed by a quantitative and qualitative analysis of newspaper articles collected
from The New York Times and Folha de S.Paulo.

INTRODUCTION

The idea behind this project was born as a personal desire to investigate the
mysterious apparent stability of Brazils multicultural identity. Brazil is such a varied
country, with so many different cultural heritages and traditions in each region, but
we still feel we are Brazilians. Differently from Italians, who usually answer to the
question Where are you from? saying Im Tuscan (or Sicilian, Neapolitan,
Sardinian etc.), we will always answer that we are Brazilians, not that we are
paulistas, cariocas, baianos etc. There is a unity to these multiple regional
identities which entitle us to be seen as a multicultural nation, a country where racial
democracy has come true a presently disputed idea which gained weight with the
publication of Gilberto Freyres masterpiece Casa Grande e Senzala in the 1930s.
Despite any possible criticism, the idea of Brazil as a multicultural country is still
very strong all over the world and has recently been used as a resource to attract
attention from the international community, as it happened with the Brazilian bid to
host the 2016 Olympic Games. During the campaign, most of the advertising videos
and especially one entitled Passion Unites Us resorted to that multicultural image to
show Brazil as a country in which all nations can come together in peace. This idea
was reinforced by presidents Luiz Incio Lula da Silva speech during the Olympic
sessions in which the poll would take place:
Looking at the five rings of the Olympic symbol, I see my country in them. A
Brazil formed by men and women from all the continents. Americans,
Europeans, Africans, Asians, all proud of their roots, and proud to be Brazilians.
We are not only a people that give meaning to the term melting pot, but we
also love being part of this melting pot. It is at the core of our identity.1
Despite having gained relevance recently, the idea of a Brazilian multiculturality is
not new and a series of Brazilian scholars especially anthropologists have

Extract of President Luiz Incio Lula da Silva speech during the 121st International Olympic

Committee Session in Copenhagen, Denmark. Oct. 2nd 2010.

http://www.olympic.org/en/content/Olympic-Games/Candidate-Cities/Elections-for-the-2016-Games.

theorized about it, from Gilberto Freyre and Srgio Buarque de Holanda to Darcy
Ribeiro and Roberto da Matta.
Departing from this eagerness to examine the Brazilian identity, the first
motivation to write this dissertation stems from two basic notions about
culture/society and the media. The first involves the belief that culture becomes
increasingly important in our globalised world, and it may become a catalyst of a
better communication, reducing cultural tensions. The second notion is related to the
weight of the communicative power of the media, in the sense that the media have the
power and ability to influence how individuals, institutions, and societies shape their
subjectivities and identities, and how they conceive of cultures different from their
own.
Since all political and social struggles in the present times necessarily passes
through mass culture, the media are absolutely central to any discussion of identity
and multiculturalism. Shohat and Stam (2006) argue that the contemporary media not
only shape identity, but also exist close to the very core of identity production. As
they affirm,
in a transnational world typified by the global circulation of images and
sounds, goods and peoples, media spectatorship impacts complexly on
national identity and communal belonging. By facilitating engagement
with distant peoples, the media deterritorialize the process of imagining
communities. () Just as the media can otherize cultures (), they can
also promote multicultural coalitions. (Shohat and Stam, 2006: 6-7)

Hence, what interests me here is to put the theories about identity and
particularly about Brazilian identity in a media perspective. It is a current idea that
identities are constructions and are intrinsically related to representation. Media news
content is a fertile ground for studying representation and representational practices,
since, as the Cultural Studies tradition takes it, news are relative to the givens of the
groups and individuals engaged in its production, and journalism is an area of
everyday culture that (re)produces meaning, sense, and consciousness and serves the
social circulation of meaning (Gottschlich, 2008: 23).
In this sense, it can be very fruitful to examine the Brazilian identity through the
analysis of its representation in different sources of news content. As I am also
4

interested in matters of difference and otherness, that also leads me to an analysis of

the representation of the Brazilian identity in foreign news, which can be seen as a
fertile site for the study of stereotypes in this regard.
The moment also seems particularly fit to analyze Brazil from the eyes of
foreigners, since the country has been on the spotlight for some time for its stable and
promising economy, for its former president Luiz Incio Lula da Silva work in
international politics and for it being chosen to host two major international sports
events in the next years: the Soccer World Cup in 2014 and the Olympic Games in
2016.
However, given the apparent stability of the Brazilian identity in an internal
context, it is also necessary to analyze the role of the national media in its fixation or
challenging, to discover if the media are an important component which helps bind
the possible competing identities into one unique national identity, or, in Shohat and
Stams words, it is important to analyze whether the Brazilian media promote
multicultural coalitions.
Therefore, this work aims at analyzing how the Brazilian identity is represented in
foreign and national news, comparing the representational practices that emerge from
the different sources and reading it in the light of theories about identity,
representation and Brazilian culture.

RESEARCH AREA

We live in a globalised society, which makes it increasingly difficult to live a life

oriented solely towards ones own citizenship, religion, and culture. The social,
economic, and political dynamics of our world are inserted into a complex matrix of
relationships between individuals, organisations, and institutions originated in
different cultures. That complex web of interrelations is complicated by the global
circulation of images, sounds, goods, and peoples, which facilitate the engagement
among distant peoples. Hence, it is a world in which the contact between different
cultures is increasingly more frequent and in which identities are not only constantly
being challenged by new social relations and configurations that emerge all the time,
but also are subject to the influence of mass culture and contemporary media, which
are argued to be at the core of identity production and shaping.
In this sense, we can argue that journalism is a powerful component of mass
culture, since, from a cultural approach, not only journalists draw upon culture to
coordinate their activities, but news itself is seen as cultural, ultimately relative to the
givens of the groups and individuals engaged in its production (Zelizer, 2004: 176,
cited in Gottschlich, 2008: 23). As we have already argued, journalism is an area of
everyday culture which serves as a sphere for the production and reproduction of
meaning, sense and consciousness (Gottschlich, 2008: 23).
As Schudson puts, news is organized as a part of culture that reproduces aspects of
a larger culture, which not necessarily (and most often are not) consciously articulated
by the reporter and the editor. In Schudsons words,
News is produced by people who operate, often unwittingly, within a
cultural system, a reservoir of stored cultural meanings. It follows
conventions of sourcing (). It lives by unspoken preconceptions about
the audience (). News as a form of culture incorporates assumptions
about what matters, what makes sense, what time and place we live in,
and what range of considerations we should take seriously. (Schudson,
2003: 190)

Hence, we can argue that news has become a significant component in the
construction of a collective experience and it also has an important role in
6

determining what is real and important. Or, as Richardson puts, journalism can help
shape social reality by shaping our views of social reality (Richardson, 2007: 13).
Acceptance of this view, consequently, implies the recognition of the importance of
studying the discourse of journalism (as a type of media discourse) in order to
uncover the power of journalistic language to do things and the way that social
power is indexed and represented in journalistic language (Richardson 2007: 13).
In this way, an analysis of media discourse can serve well our purpose of
investigating the representation of identities in this case, the Brazilian identity and
can provide us with insights about the culture in which these representations are
constructed.

Research questions

Considering the above-mentioned points, there are some questions that become
relevant:

What are the main characteristics of the Brazilian identity read through the
foreign media?

What are the main characteristics of the Brazilian identity read through the
national media?

Are these representations in tune with what the theories say about Brazilian
identity?

THEORIES

Going back to the tradition of Cultural Studies, Stuart Hall says that the question,
and the theorization, of identity is a matter of considerable political significance
(Hall, 2002: 16). From the discursive point of view, identification is a signifying
process and identities emerge within the play of specific modalities of power, and
thus are more the product of the marking of difference and exclusion, than they are
the sign of an identical, naturally-constituted unity (Hall, 2002: 4). In this way, the
investigation of identity is also the investigation of power and exclusion, which make
it relevant in any context and makes it crucial to the work we intend to develop here,
since the question, and the theorization of identity in this case, Brazilian identity
together with the question of representation more specifically, representation of the
Brazilian identity by national and foreign news vehicles is the task that this work
proposes to accomplish.
Therefore, before we go into the proper analysis of the media texts that will allow
us to draw our conclusions about the media representation of Brazilian identity, it is
necessary to spend some time clarifying the theories of identity and representation
that inform this study. In the later part of this chapter, we will also investigate some of
the mainstream theories about the formation of Brazilian culture and identity.

Identity, imagined communities and representation

As Hall (2002) explains, identity is usually seen as constructed based on the

recognition of shared origins, characteristics or ideals among a group of people and its
logical consequence is regarded as solidarity and allegiance. It is also commonly seen
as the collective self, hiding inside the many other superficial or artificially imposed
selves which people with shared history and ancestry hold, which can fix or guarantee
a cultural belongingness.
However, the author takes on a discursive approach on the matter that makes
explicit the construction behind the constitution of identities. This approach begins
8

with the use of the term identification to replace identity, since it stress the process of
subjectification to discursive practices, and the politics of exclusion which all such
subjectification appears to entail (Hall, 2002: 2).
According to Hall, the discursive approach sees identification as a construction in
the sense that it is conditional, not determined, a process never completed (Hall,
2002: 2). As a signifying practice, identification is subject to the play of difference:
since as a process it operates across difference, it entails discursive work,
the binding and marking of symbolic boundaries, the production of
frontier-effects. It requires what is left outside, its constitutive outside,
to consolidate the process. (Hall, 2002: 3)

In other words, the construction of identity or the process of identification can

only happen in contrast with the Other, in opposition to what is strange to that
group, culture or nation.
Because identities are constructed within discourse, it is necessary to understand it
in the context of specific historical and institutional positions and according to
specific discursive formations and practices, which are obtained through specific
enunciative strategies (Hall: 2002).
As a discursive practice, the process of identification also entails that in late
modern times, identities are increasingly fragmented, never singular but multiply
constructed across different, often intersecting and antagonistic, discourses, practices
and positions (Hall, 2002: 4). In this sense, any discussion about identity has to be
situated within the historical moment and the historical changes that destabilized the
more or less stable character of many cultures and groups, especially the processes of
globalization and of forced and free migration. Here, it is interesting to note the
similarity of this idea to the concept of derritorialisation of the process of imagining
communities (presented in the previous chapter) which, according to Shohat and Stam
(2006: 6), is the consequence of a transnational world characterised by the global
circulation of images, sounds, goods, peoples, that impact on national identity and
communal belonging.
In this sense, the relevance of studying identity in a media context is strongly
connected to a perception of identity which is linked to the process of representation,
9

considering that, as put by Hall, identities are constituted within representation. As he

explains, although identities
seem to invoke an origin in a historical past with which they continue to
correspond, actually identities are about questions of using the resources
of history, language and culture in the process of becoming rather than
being: not who we are or where we came from, so much as what we
might become, how we have been represented and how that bears on how
we might represent ourselves. (Hall, 2002: 4)

That is not only a view that connects identity to representation but also transforms
identity in something dependent on it. In this sense, identification is less about
tradition itself than about the invention of tradition. This invention is related to the
narrative component of the process: the narrativisation of the self, the necessary
fictional nature of the process that creates belongingness and allows identities to arise,
which do not undermine its discursive, material or political effectivety (Hall, 2002: 4).
This fictional component is also crucial to the idea of nation argued by Benedict
Anderson in his Imagined Communities. In this work, Anderson investigates the
development of the concept of nation an imagined political community and
imagined as both inherently limited and sovereign (Anderson, 2006: 6) and the
importance of the imaginary to its formation.
According to Anderson, a nation is an imagined community because the members
of even the smallest of nations will never get to know, meet or hear of most of their
fellow-members. However, each member of a nation has in his/her mind the image of
their communion.
To Shohat and Stam (2006), beliefs about the origins and evolution of nations
often crystallize in the form of stories. Thus, nations are a fictive unity imposed on an
aggregate of individual and national histories are presented as if they displayed the
continuity of the subject-writ-large (Shohat and Stam, 2006: 101). In this sense, as
Anderson explains, the collective national self-consciousness that is, the shared
belief of different individuals that they share common origins, status, location, and
aspirations was made possible by a common language and its expression in print
capitalism (Anderson, 2006: 42-46).

10

Anderson points that the first two forms of imagining a nation first flowered in
Europe in the 18th century, and they were the novel and the newspaper. According to
him, these two forms provided the technical means for re-presenting the kind of
imagined community that is the nation (Anderson, 2006: 24).
The logical outcome of the above mentioned points is that newspapers made
people aware of the simultaneity and interconnectedness of events in different places
(Shohat and Stam, 2006: 102). That is made possible by the fact that, nevertheless the
mass ceremony of newspaper consuming is performed individually, each individual is
aware that the activity he is performing is being repeated simultaneously by thousands
(or millions) of other people of whose existence he is confident, yet of whose identity
he has not the slightest notion that is, his co-nationals. Furthermore, as Anderson
points, this ceremony is repeated at least daily and, at the same time, the newspaper
reader, seeing exact replicas of his own newspaper being consumed by people he sees
or meets throughout his daily routine, is continually reassured that the imagined world
is rooted in everyday life (Anderson, 2006: 35-36). Therefore, the contribution of
newspaper consuming to the process of imagining a community is not only a matter
of repetition of a particular activity by members of a community, but also a question
of repetition of readership of the same content by a large group of people, which
validate this content as real and as noteworthy.
These ideas can be connected to the argument that the work of journalism, apart
from creating the sense of community, also shapes the reality in which this
community live, since, as put by Schudson (2003: 2), although working with materials
that real people and real events provide, journalists have to select, highlight and
frame, thus creating an impression that real people then take to be real and to which
they respond in their lives.
In this sense, news builds expectations of a common, shared world and have
become a dominant force in the public construction of common experience and a
popular sense of what is real and important (Schudson, 2003: 13). It also endorses a
historical mentality and encourages a progressive rather than cyclical or recursive
sense of time. (Schudson, 2003: 12). According to Anderson, this idea of a
sociological organism moving calendrically through homogenous, empty time is a
precise analogue of the idea of the nation, which also is conceived as a solid
11

community moving steadily down (or up) history (Anderson, 2006: 26). That
analogy makes the event of news even more significant to the process of imagining a
community.
Another important aspect to take into consideration in the relation between news
and the imagining of a nation is the fact that a news report can be seen as a story a
constructed reality with its own internal validity (Schudson, 2003: 4) thus
constituting what Shohat and Stam (2006: 101) call an element that crystallizes
beliefs about the origins and evolution of nations.
When we deal with the process of imagining a community which also entails the
constitution of identities and the implications of newspapers production and
consumption to the process, we are also dealing with the question of representation,
since reality is represented in the stories that are produced by journalism.
As we have already seen, identities are constituted within the process of
representation, as put by Hall. And, if that is true, it is important to examine how the
process of representation works and which consequences it bears to the groups or
individuals that are being represented.
In a cultural sense, Shohat and Stam (2006) argue, an obsession with realism
treats the matter as simply one of errors and distortions, as if the truth of a
community were unproblematic, transparent, and easily accessible, and it was
possible to promptly unmask lies about that community. However, recognizing the
inevitability and the inescapability of representation does not mean, as Stuart Hall has
put it, that nothing is at stake. Therefore, we can consider that, although there is no
absolute truth, no truth apart from representation and dissemination, there are still
contingent, qualified, perspectival truths in which communities are invested (Shohat
and Stam, 2006: 179).
In a very basic sense, representation could be defined as the process that connects
meaning, language and culture; it is the relation between things, concepts and signs
and it lies at the heart of the production of meaning in language. It is also an essential
part of the process through which members of a culture produce and exchange
meaning (Hall: 1997).

12

The connotations of representation can also be seen as at once religious,

aesthetic, political and semiotic (Shohat and Stam, 2006: 182):
What all these instances share is the semiotic principle that something is
standing for something else, or that some person or group is speaking
on behalf of some other persons or groups. On the symbolic battlegrounds
of the mass media, the struggle over representation in the simulacral realm
homologizes that of the political sphere, where questions of imitation and
representation easily slide into issues of delegation and voice. (Shohat and
Stam, 2006: 183)

In our discussion here we have to go further and examine the process of

representation within the context of representing a group of people, especially a group
of people that is not a part of the community from which a particular text is produced
(which is the case of the articles from foreign newspapers on issues about Brazil that
we will analyze later). Here, we are mostly interested on how difference and
otherness are being represented.
Hall (1997) analyzes the matter taking as a departure point images of black people
in the press, but many of his conclusions can be broadened to other issues that involve
difference and to other materials that not images texts, for example.
According to Hall (1997), at the broader level of how difference and otherness
are represented in a particular culture, one notices similar representational practices
and figures being repeated with variations from one text or site of representation to
another. This accumulation of meanings across different texts, where one image refers
to another, or has its meanings altered by being read in the context of other images
is called inter-textuality (Hall, 1997: 232).
In this context, he refers to the whole repertoire through which difference is
represented at any historical moment as a regime of representation (Hall, 1997: 232).
According to him, the regime of representation is a matter of inter-textuality since the
images (or texts) representing the otherness and difference gain in meaning when
they are read in context, against or in connection with other texts. It is clear that each
text or image carry its own, specific meaning. However, they also accumulate
meanings, or play off their meanings against one another, across a variety of texts and
media.
13

Going back to the question of difference, which we have already seen is crucial
to the constitution of identities, we can look to it from four different theoretical
approaches (Hall, 1997: 234-238):
1.

Linguistics this approach is associated with Saussure and the use of language
as a model of how culture works; the main argument here is that difference
matters because it is essential to meaning; without it, meaning could not exist
(Hall, 1997: 234). Saussure stated that everyone knows what black means,
practically, not based on the essence of blackness but because comparison
can be made with its opposite white , thus, according to him, meaning is
relational and it is the difference between black and white which signifies,
and which carries meaning and messages. Accordingly, meaning depends on
the difference between opposites and there is always a relation of power
between the poles of a binary opposition (Derrida, 1974, cited in Hall, 1997:
235).

2.

Theories of language the second explanation comes from a different school

of theories of language and the argument here is that we need difference
because we can only construct meaning through a dialogue with the Other
(Hall, 1997: 235). This second explanation is based on Mikhail Bakhtins
study of language as not an objective system, but in terms of how meaning is
sustained in the dialogue between two or more speakers. So everything we say
and mean is modified by the interaction and interplay with another person,
indicating that meaning arises through the difference between the
participants in any dialogue, where the Other is essential to meaning that
is the positive side of Bakhtins theory while the negative side is that meaning
cannot be fixed and that one group can never be completely in charge of
meaning (Hall, 1997: 236).

3.

Anthropological the argument here is that culture depends on giving things

meaning by assigning them to different positions within a classificatory
system. The marking of difference is thus the basis of that symbolic order
which we call culture (Hall, 1997: 236). Basically, social groups always order
and organise things into classificatory system by imposing meaning on the
world they live. According to this argument, then, symbolic boundaries are
central to all cultures. Marking difference leads us, symbolically, to close
14

ranks, shore up culture and to stigmatise and expel anything which is defined
as impure, abnormal. However, paradoxically, it also makes difference
powerful, strangely attractively precisely because it is forbidden, taboo,
threatening to cultural order. Thus, what is socially peripheral is often
symbolically centred (Babcock, 1978: 32, cited in Hall, 1997: 237).
4.

Psychoanalytic the fourth kind of explanation relates to the role of

difference in our psychic life. The argument here is that the Other is
fundamental to the constitution of the self, to us as subject, and to sexual
identity. According to Hall , this view of difference entails that the rise of
subjectivity and the formation of a sense of self can only happen through the
symbolic and unconscious relations which the young child forges with a
significant Other which is different from itself. The downside of this
account lies in the fact that the psychoanalytic perspective assumes that, since
our subjectivities are formed through this troubled, never-completed,
unconscious dialogue with Other, psychically we are never fully unified as
subjects and there is not such a thing as a given, stable inner core to the self
or to identity.

Based on the above discussed four approaches, there are two clear points to take
note: firstly, the question of difference and otherness, deducing from different
directions and within many different disciplines, plays a significant role in the matter
of identity. Secondly, difference is ambivalent, which can be both positive and
negative, since it is both necessary for the production of meaning, the formation of
language and culture, for social identities and a subjective sense of the self and at
the same time, it is threatening, a site of danger, of negative feelings, of splitting,
hostility and aggression towards the Other (Hall, 1997: 238).
To go further in the study of the regime of representation of difference, we have to
examine the set of representational practices known as stereotyping. Stereotyping is a
practice that reduces people to a few, simple, essential characteristics, which are
represented as fixed by nature. It bears essentialising, reductionist and naturalizing
effects.
Since stereotyping is a signifying practice which is central to the representation of
difference, it is necessary to make a clear distinction between the terms typing and
stereotyping, as advocated by Richard Dyer (1977, cited in Hall, 1997: 257). Dyer
15

argues that, without the use of types, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to make
sense of the world. We understand the world by referring individual objects, people or
events in our minds to the general classificatory schemes into which, according to our
culture, they fit. In other words, we understand the particular in terms of its type;
in this sense, typing is essential to the production of meaning.
Dyer (1977: 28, cited in Hall, 1997: 257) also argues that we always make sense
of things in terms of wider categories. To get to know something about a person, for
example, we think of the role he or she performs, we assign him/her to the
membership of different groups (class, gender, age, nationality, race, language, sexual
preference etc.), we evaluate his/her personality type and so on. Therefore, our picture
of someone is built up out of the information we gather from positioning him/her
within these different orders of typification. In broad terms, a type is any simple,
vivid, memorable, easily grasped and widely recognised characterisation in which a
few traits are foregrounded and change or development is kept to minimum (Dyer,
1977: 28, cited in Hall, 1997: 257).
Stereotypes, on the other hand, get hold of the simple, vivid, memorable, easily
grasped and widely recognised characteristics about a person, reduce everything
about the person to these traits, exaggerate, simplify and fix them without change or
development to eternity (Hall, 1997:258).
Hence, stereotyping deploys three basic characteristics, and these are:
1.

Stereotyping reduces, essentialises, naturalises and fixes.

2.

Stereotyping deploys a strategy of splitting. This is where there is a clear

division between the normal and the acceptable from the abnormal and the
unacceptable. In other words, stereotyping can be seen as part of maintenance
of social and symbolic order that sets up a symbolic frontier between the
normal and the deviant, the normal and the pathological, the
acceptable and the unacceptable, what belongs and what does not or is
Other, between insiders and outsiders, Us and Them. It also
facilitates the binding or bonding together of all of Us who are normal
into one imagined community; and it sends into exile all of Them (the
Others), who are in some way different beyond the pale (Hall, 1997:
258).
16

3.

Stereotyping tends to occur where there are gross inequalities of power. This
is so because power is usually directed against the subordinate or excluded
group. One aspect of this power, according to Dyer (1977, cited in Hall, 1997),
is ethnocentrism the application of the norms of ones own culture to that of
others (see also Brown, 1965: 183, cited in Hall, 1997: 258). If we take the
binary oppositions like Us and Them into consideration, then we are not
dealing with [] peaceful coexistence [] but rather a violent hierarchy. One
of the two teams governs [] the other or has the upper hand (Hall, 1997:
258). This is what both Foucault and Gramsci referred to as regimes of
power/knowledge, which classify people according to norms and constructs
that excludes the other; and as an aspect of the struggle for hegemony.

Hegemony is a form of power based on leadership by a group in many fields of

activity at once, so that its ascendency commands widespread consent and appears
natural and inevitable. In support of this, Dyer (1977, cited in Hall, 1997) observed
that normalcy (i.e. what is acceptable as normal) is usually established socially
with stereotypes being one aspect of the habit of ruling groups [] to attempt to
fashion the whole of society according to their own world view, value system,
sensibility and ideology. He completes saying that so right is this world view for the
ruling groups that they make it appear (as it does appear to them) as natural and
inevitable and for everyone and, in so far as they succeed, they establish their
hegemony (Dyer, 1977: 30, cited in Hall, 1997: 259).
From this discussion we can conclude that the opposition between us and then
and the construction and uses of stereotypes are essential matters to the analysis that
will be held later on in this work. On the one hand, concerning the analysis of foreign
news on Brazil, we are clearly dealing with the representation of an internationally
less privileged group (the people from the emerging but still developing that is
Brazil), by an hegemonic culture (the English speaking and First World nation of the
United States, approached through the discourse of its major newspaper The New
York Times). On the other hand, concerning the analysis of national news about some
issues that concern Brazilian society, we are dealing with the representation of
Brazilian identity through the eyes of an economic and cultural elite the owners and
producers of newspapers which may or may not account for the complexity of the

17

multicultural constitution of the country and the interests of less privileged groups
within that particular society.
From this point of view, it will be interesting to observe the regimes of
representation and the recurrent images that will emerge from the analysis of both
foreign and national news.
From the point of view of identity constitution and community imagining, we may
conclude that news are essential to both process, since identity constitution is
intrinsically linked to how we have been represented and how that bears on how we
might represent ourselves; in this sense, it will be interesting to note how the
representation of Brazilian identities in news relate to the idea of Brazilian identity
put through by researches of the matter. It is also important to remember that, as we
have already seen, the marking of difference is essential to both the constitution of
identity and the process of representation; hence, in our analyzes, we shall pay careful
attention to what is left outside as well.
At the same time, the process of imagining a community and creating a nation
relies heavily both in the collective activity of consuming news and the forging of a
imaginary that follows this activity and help shape reality by creating a sense of what
is real and relevant; therefore, through the analysis of the sample we may be able to
infer which aspects of Brazilian identity are passed as real and relevant internationally
and nationally.
But before we can proceed to the discussion of the methods of analysis and the
proper analysis of the sample of newspaper articles, we have to give an historical
account of the ideas surrounding the constitution of a Brazilian identity.

Theoretical accounts of Brazilian identity

As this research aims at analysing how specific version of Brazilian national

identity were constructed by the media and journalists, in this section, we will present
some theoretical standpoints concerning identity, especially those characterizing
Brazilian culture. The choice of ideas presented here concern works and authors that
18

have dealt with the question of national identity, especially within the historical
process. Furthermore, the authors were chosen by their relevance to the historical
development of an idea of Brazilian culture and identity. This works are:
-

Casa-Grande & Senzala (The Masters and the Slaves), by Gilberto Freyre,
first published in 1933;

Razes do Brasil (Roots of Brazil), by Srgio Buarque de Holanda, first

published in 1936;

Carnavais, Malandros e Heris (Carnivals, Rogues and Heroes), by

Roberto da Matta, first published in 1979;

O Povo Brasileiro (The Brazilian People), by Darcy Ribeiro, first

published in 1995.

We do not intend to present a full account of the works above mentioned, just to
give an outline of the main ideas contained in them, paying close attention to the
features that allow us to characterize the idea of Brazilian identity that has been
predominant in the Academy and to discern its characteristic marks.
Shohat and Stam (2006: 43) emphasize the hybrid (or, in the terms we have been
using so far, multicultural) characteristic of Latin America identities by arguing that,
although hybridity is a cultural phenomenon that exists from immemorial times, the
European colonization of the Americas took it to another level. As they explain,
Although mixing of population predated the conquista, the colonizing
process initiated by Columbus accelerated and actively shaped a new
world of practices and ideologies of mixing, making the Americas the
scene of unprecedented combinations of indigenous peoples, Africans and
Europeans, and later of immigratory diasporas from all over the world.
These combinations have generated, especially in the Caribbean and in
South America, a wide-ranging vocabulary of racial descriptive terms to
account for all the permutations (mestizo/a, mulato/a, creolo/a,
moreno/a). Mixing has not only been a reality but an ideology in which
sex and race have played the major roles. (Shohat and Stam, 2006: 43)

They also point that Latin American intellectuals have tended, at least from the
beginning of the nineteenth century, to conceive national identity in racially plural
terms. In the case of Brazil, it was in the 1930s that this position found powerful
19

expression in the work of Gilberto Freyre, an anthropologist from the Northeast of the
country, whose Casa-Grande & Senzala (The Masters and the Slaves, 1933), was
a milestone in the treatment of race in Brazil, in that it removed the discussion out of
the realms of physiology and into those of culture, and for the first time gave a
positive value to the contribution of blacks to the nation.
One of the first notorious works on the subject, Casa-Grande & Senzala
represented for Brazilian scholarship a kind of intellectual passport, as a display of the
capacity to build a social theory of Brazil. The oeuvre is a landmark in Brazilian
sociology, with its frank treatment of the sexual lives and patriarchy and the decisive
importance attributed to slaves in the conformation of our intimate way of being.
As Shohat and Stam (2006: 242) point, Freyre viewed Brazils racial diversity as
the key to its creativity and originality:
What Freyre was fond of calling New World in the Tropics was for him
made possible by the cultural fusion of three genetically equal races (the
Portuguese, the Indian and the African), each of which, he believed, had
made an invaluable contribution, even if he tented to romanticize slavery
and folklorize the Black and the indigenous contributions. (Shohat and
Stam, 2006: 242)

Indeed, Freyre went so far as to affirm that Every Brazilian, even the lightskinned fair-haired one, carries about with him on his soul, when not on soul and
body alike () the shadow, or at least the birthmark, of the aborigine or the Negro
(Freyre, 1986: 278).
Freyre tended to idealize the sugar-plantation economy, which survived, along
with its traditional oligarchy, longer in the Northeast than in other parts of the
country, and which he saw as a original model for the whole country, in part because
it was the first colonial economy to flourish in Brazil. Although Freyres ideas have
been under heavy dispute since their publication especially when it comes to the use
of the expression racial democracy to characterize the Brazilian society , it is hard
to deny that he forms a central part of the national ideology that has developed since
the 1930s, and which says, in essence, that Brazil is the greatest example of racial
democracy on earth. Freyre argues that because Portugal was a maritime nation and
had long been receiving and commercializing with peoples from different parts of the
20

world, and also because races were being mixed in the Iberian Peninsula for centuries,
the Portuguese developed a kind of tolerance to racial difference not to be found
amongst the other colonising nations of Europe. This characteristic lead to the
capacity of the Portuguese people to easily mix themselves with other races. They
arrived in Brazil without their families, alone, needy of human contact and started to
mate first with the Indians and later with the African slaves. The consequence was a
widespread sexual intimacy which produced a predominantly mulatto nation, and a
kind of social intimacy which crosses enormously wide class divides.
Another point taken by Freyre to explain the unity of the country is the fact that the
Portuguese did not bring to Brazil any kind of political separatism or religious
divergences, and they were not concerned with racial purity as well. Hence, the unity
of the great territorial extension, which bore deep regional differences, held together
by the use of force in several occasions, was made possible mostly because of the
uniformity of language and religion.
Following Freyres Casa-Grande & Senzala comes Razes do Brasil (roots of
Brazil), published by the historian Srgio Buarque de Holanda just three years later,
in 1936. His work is another landmark in the studies of Brazilian culture and society
and can be considered one of the founders of the modern Brazilian historiography and
social sciences, which has not lost its actuality and continues to be studied until the
present day.
Antonio Candido, who signs the preface of the book, emphasizes the importance of
the work and the relevance of the method used by De Holanda, which is constructed
through the exploration of polarized concepts, building enlightenment through the
dialectic play between oppositions. Using this tool, De Holanda analyzes the
foundations of our historical destiny, the roots of the title, showing their
manifestations in the most diverse aspects. As Antonio Candido says,
Work and adventure; method and care; rural and urban; bureaucracy and
charismatic autocracy [the untranslatable caudilhismo]; impersonal
norm and affectionate impulse are pairs that the author highlights in the
way of being or in the social and political structure, to analyze and

21

understand Brazil and Brazilians. (De Holanda, 1995: 13)2

In order to analyze and understand Brazil and Brazilians, De Holanda goes back
to the configuration of the Iberian society to trace the origins of some of the traces
that he will explore in the book. It is the case of the traditional personalism, from
which derives the laxity of institutions and the lack of social cohesion. Linked to that
idea is the absence of the principle of hierarchy and the praise of the personal prestige
related to privilege that were characteristics of the Iberian Peninsula. As a
consequence, nobility remained open to merit and success, that is, accessible,
favouring a certain general inclination to aristocracy. This inclination was also related
to the repulse towards regular work and utilitarian activities another fundamental
theme of Razes do Brasil , which caused a lack of organisation in the society.
De Holanda also distinguishes between two types of ethics: the worker and the
adventurer. While the latter searches for new experiences, accommodates himself in
the provisory and prefers discovering to consolidating, the first values security and
effort, accepting compensation in the long run. According to De Holanda, the
American continent was colonized by adventurous men and the worker had a very
limited, almost inexistent role (De Holanda, 1995: 45). The factors that were
opposed to the spirit of work were reinforced by the slavery, which would have
killed in the free man the necessity to cooperate and organize themselves.
The rural character of the Brazilian society, which was based in dominant rural
groups, supported by the economic and familiar autarchy, manifests itself in the
mental plane by the over-appreciation of talent, of intellectual activities that are not
linked to manual work and which seem to emerge from an innate quality.
Another key component of Razes do Brasil is the concept of the amicable
man (homem cordial). De Holanda argues that, formed inside the familiar
structure, the Brazilian received the burden of the relationships of empathy, which
would make it more difficult to him to be normally incorporated into other kinds of

All the texts that are referred to in their original versions, published in Portuguese, were freely

translated by the author of this work.

22

grouping. Hence, the Brazilian does not find impersonal relations, characteristic of the
State, as being pleasant, thus trying to reduce them to personal and affection patterns.
In this sense, the idea of an amicable man does not entail kindness, but only the
prevalence of behaviours of affectionate appearance, including its external
manifestations, not necessarily sincere or deep, which are opposed to the politeness
ritualism. In the way De Holanda puts it, it would be a mistake to assume that those
virtues may mean good manners, civility. They are above all legitimate expressions
of an extremely rich and overflowing emotional core (De Holanda, 1995: 147). As
he explains
Our ordinary way of social coexistence is, in reality, exactly the opposite
of politeness. It can delude in its appearance and that is explained by the
fact that the polite attitude consists precisely on a kind of deliberate mimic
of manifestations that are spontaneous in the amicable man: it is the
natural and vivid form converted into a formula. (De Hollanda, 1995: 147)

De Holanda explains this attitude as a defence against society, a kind of mask

which the individual puts to be able to maintain its supremacy over the social, a
search for a type of intimacy that prevents the occurrence of situations in which the
individual has to put himself as inferior or subaltern for prolonged time.
To this amicable mentality are linked various important traces of our society,
such as a sociability that is only apparent, which does not impose itself to the
individual and does not have a positive effect in the structuring of a collective order,
from which follows an individualism that manifests itself with reluctance in the face
of a law that goes against it.
In our timeline of the ideas about the Brazilian identity and culture developed
within the context of Brazilian social sciences, the next work we are going to examine
is Carnavais, Malandros e Heris (Carnivals, Rogues and Heroes), first published
by the anthropologist Roberto da Matta in 1979.
One of the main ambitions of Da Mattas work is to understand not what we have
of historical, dated and changing, but what is permanent and lasting. The attempt to
uncover the Brazilian reality behind its most notorious self-images is performed
through the study of the Brazilian daily life and its rituals and action models.
23

Central to this work is the dilemma between the extremely authoritarian,

hierarchical and violent aspects of Brazilian society and the search for a harmonious,
democratic and non-conflicting world in this same society. In this context, the
opposition between individual and person becomes crucial and the two concepts
become the general categories for the authors argument. According to Da Matta, the
individual, in the Brazilian context, is defined in contrast with its contrary: the person.
The person, on the other hand, is defined as a basically relational being, a notion that
is only understandable with reference to a social system in which relations of
collusion, family, friendship and exchange of interests and favours constitute a
fundamental element. In the individual, on the contrary, we could see a structural
continuity with the world of impersonal laws that subjugate and subordinate.
Da Matta also insists in the extreme hierarchisation of Brazilian society, which
operates a dissociation between two ideal worlds that are present in the Brazilian
mythology: the world of the home, in which people are valued by what they are and
peace and harmony rein; and the world of the street, in which the individuals fight
for their life in a cruel and anonymous battle.
In Da Mattas view, while parades and religious processions ritualize and make it
explicit the hierarchical and authoritarian aspects of Brazilian society, Carnival and
the popular heroes dramatize its opposite. The singularity of Carnival is the fact that,
for a few days, the street becomes home and ideals of spontaneous, affectionate and
symmetrical relations are transported to the street, transforming in a safe place the
usually inhumane, competitive and hostile environment of the street. In this sense,
Carnival is an inversion of Brazilian reality.
Another important feature of Brazilian society, according to Da Matta, is the use of
the phrase do you whore talking to?, which is an authoritarian ritual that Brazilians
prefer to keep hidden. As Da Matta explains,
in the drama of do you know who youre talking to?, we are punished
for the attempt to enforce the law or for our idea that we live in a really
egalitarian universe. Because the identity that emerges in the conflict is
what will allow the hierarchisation. (Da Matta, 1997: 216)

And he continues:
24

It is as if we had two foundations through which we think our system. In

the case of general laws and repression, we always follow the bureaucratic
code or the impersonal and universalizing, egalitarian, version of the
system. However, in the case of concrete situations, those which life
presents us, we always follow the code of personal relationships and
morality, taking the way of the jeitinho [an attitude that allows a way
out of any difficult or problematic situation, usually by twisting or
ignoring the rules], of malandragem [trickery] and solidarity as an
axis for action. In the first choice, our unity is the individual; in the
second one, the person. The person deserves solidarity and a
differentiated treatment. The individual, on the contrary, is the subject of
law, the abstract focus to whom rules and repression were made. (Da
Matta, 1997: 218)

Another point taken by Da Matta is that, in a society so strongly hierarchical,

conflicts are seen as extremely disturbing, since open conflicts are marked by the
representativeness of opinions and are a revealing trace of an individualistic
egalitarianism, which, between us, almost always clashes violently with the
hierarchising structure of our society (Da Matta, 1997: 184). In this way, in the
Brazilian society, conflicts are seen as abnormalities.
Last but not least, we are going to examine O Povo Brasileiro (The Brazilian
People), work of the anthropologist Darcy Ribeiro, which, for its later publication
when compared to the other already examined oeuvres (it was published in 1995 as
the result of 30 years of work), also draws on and follows many of the ideas that we
already discussed. He points that the Brazilian people acknowledge themselves, feel
like and behave as one single people, belonging to the same ethnic group a national
ethnic group, a nation-people.
To Ribeiro, in Brazil, disparate racial matrixes, distinct cultural traditions and
obsolete social forms clashed and merged to give rise to a new people. It is a new
people to the extent that it emerges as a national ethnicity, culturally different from its
forming matrixes, strongly hybrid, boosted by a syncretised culture and singularized
by the redefinition of cultural traces originated in those matrixes. As he points,
New also because it sees itself and is seen as a new people, a new human
genre different of the ones already existent. New people, yet, because it is
a new model of societal structuring, which inaugurates a singular form of
social-economical organization, founded in a renewed kind of slavery and
in a continuous servitude to the world market. New, again, for the
25

implausible joy and astounding will to happiness, in a so much sacrificed

people, which encourage and touch all Brazilians. (Ribeiro, 2006: 17)

Ribeiro argues that, although the mix of such varied matrixes could have resulted
in a multiethnic society, torn apart by the opposition of discrepant and unmixable
components, what happened is that, despite the fact that the signs of the multiple
ancestry remained in the spirit and in the somatic physiognomy of the Brazilian, it did
not differentiate into antagonistic racial, cultural or regional minorities.
This basic ethnic unity does not mean any uniformity though, because three
diversifying forces acted upon it. The ecologic force, which created distinct human
landscapes where the environment demanded adaptation; the economic force, which
created different forms of production; and immigration, which introduced new human
contingents however, these new populations already found a formed nation, capable
of absorbing and brazilianising them.
In the way Ribeiro sees it, the unity of Brazil as a nation-people results from a
continuing and violent process of political unification, realized through a deliberate
effort of suppression of any disparate ethnic identity and of repression and oppression
of any virtually separatist tendency.
Continuing his discourse on the uniqueness of the Brazilian people, Ribeiro argues
that we are not and nobody takes us as extensions of whiteness. We have other
guidelines and other ways taken from more people. Which, he points, do not make us
poorer, but richer of humanities, more human. This bizarre singularity of ours was a
hundred times threatened, but was fortunately able to be consolidated.
Another characteristic of the configuration of the Brazilian people would be that,
in here, there has always been coexistence between an entrepreneurial prosperity and
a generalized poverty of the local population. In fact, society was not more than a
conglomerate of multiethnic peoples from Europe, Africa or natives, formed by
intense miscegenation, brutal genocide that exterminated tribal peoples and radical
ethnocide which caused indigenous and African contingents to lose their characters.
Paradoxically, it was in this way that, according to Ribeiro, it was possible to
achieve ideal conditions to the ethnic transfiguration through the forced
26

de-indianisation of natives and de-africanisation of blacks, which, without their

original identities, were forced to invent a new ethnicity which could encompass all of
them.
This mass of mulattos and mestizos of natives and whites, lusitanianised by the
Portuguese language that they spoke and by the worldview that they absorbed, began
to create the Brazilian ethnicity and to simultaneously promote its integration in the
form of a Nation-State. When the nation received large contingents of European and
Japanese immigrants, it was already mature, a fact that made possible the assimilation
of this newcomers in the condition of generic Brazilians.
Ribeiro points that what dissociates and separates Brazilians are not separatist
ethnic contingents, but class stratification. However, it is this stratification that,
especially in its lower side, unifies and articulates the huge predominantly dark
masses as Brazilians.
In its final considerations, Ribeiro again stresses the importance of miscegenation
to the constitution of the Brazilian people:
We, Brazilians, () are a mestizo people in flesh and spirit, since
miscegenation was never a crime nor a sin in here. In it we were made and
continue to make ourselves. This mass of natives originated from
miscegenation lived for centuries without a consciousness of themselves,
sunk in nobodyness. It was like this until it defined itself as a new
national-ethnic identity, that of Brazilians. () Looking at them, hearing
them, it is easy to realize they are, in fact, a new romanity, a late but better
romanity, because it is washed in Indian and black blood. (Ribeiro, 2006:
410)

He once again emphasizes the homogeneity of the Brazilian people which he

claim to be one of the most linguistic and cultural homogenous and socially
integrated people on Earth (Ribeiro, 2006: 410), for it speaks the same language,
without dialects, and does not shelter any contingent that demands autonomy to,
then, finalize the book with a discourse that can be seen as very optimistic and almost
too much enthusiastic:
In reality, what we are is a new Rome. A late and tropical Rome. Brazil
already is the biggest of the neo-Latin nations, for its population
magnitude, and it also begins to be it for artistic and cultural creativity.
Now, it needs to be it in the dominion of the technology of the future
27

civilization, to make itself an economic power, of self-sustained progress.

We are building ourselves in the struggle to flower tomorrow as a new
civilization, miscegenated and tropical, proud of itself. More joyful,
because more suffered. Better, because it incorporates in itself more
humanity. More generous, because open to the coexistence with all races
and all cultures and because placed in the most beautiful and luminous
province on Earth. (Ribeiro, 2006: 411)

***
To conclude our discussion about the paths taken by the studies of Brazilian
culture and identity, it is useful to summarize the ideas of each of the works
discussed, so we can clarify the traces of Brazilian identity as seen by some of the
most important Brazilian scholars on the matter that will later guide us in our
analysis of the media discourse.
From Freyres work, the most noteworthy component to the purposes of this
research is the racially mixed character of Brazilian identity, an identity that puts
together characteristics from European, indigenous and African cultures, with an
emphasis to the contributions that the latter left to this identity through the
configuration of a rural economy based on sugar cane plantations and slave workforces that also made part of the everyday living of their masters houses, leading to a
special kind of social intimacy amongst different races and classes. In this way, racial
mix, African traits, and social intimacy are the keywords here.
From De Holandas work, we should emphasize the importance of personalism in
the social lives of Brazilians; the repulse towards regular work and utilitarian
activities inherited from our Iberian founding fathers, which entails an overappreciation of talent and activities that seem to emerge from an innate quality; and
a lack of organization of the society, being noteworthy that the latter two points were
reinforced by slavery. Another very important aspect of De Holandas ideas is the
concept of amicability, which is related to personalism and in which relationships of
empathy are predominant in the social lives of Brazilians and impersonal relations are
seen as unpleasant and reduced to personalistic patterns. This amicability must be
seen not as an affectionate, civil and polite behaviour, but as apparent sociability, and
individualism that make the individual reluctant towards laws that go against it.
Hence, the keywords here are personalism, lack of inclination to work, amicability
28

and individualism.
From Da Mattas work, the main points are the opposition between the pairs
individual and person, impersonal laws and personal relations and street and home, all
of them inscribed in a extremely hierarchical society that sees conflicts as a threat to
the order of things and in which everybody has to know their place in order for the
system to work in a harmonic way. These oppositions are complicated by the
existence of a dualistic pattern in which the domains can be subverted in certain
occasions, especially by rituals that bring the person to the street, such as Carnival (a
festivity which is the inversion of the hierarchic structure of the Brazilian system),
jeitinho (an attitude that allows a way out of a difficult or problematic situation,
usually by twisting or ignoring the rules), trickery (malandragem) and the use of the
phrase do you who youre talking to?, which brings the code of personal
relationships to the domain of general laws. Thus, the keywords (which are more like
key-phrases) here are opposition between impersonal laws and personal relations,
hierarchy, aversion to conflicts and rituals of subversion of the system.
From Ribeiros work, which is also the most optimistic of the four works we have
examined, we have to note the emphasis given to the novelty of the hybrid,
syncretised, varied and yet homogenous character of the national ethnic group that are
Brazilians. Ribeiro insists that, as we were born from different cultural and ethnic
matrixes, as we are made of more peoples, we are also richer of humanities and more
open to the coexistence will all races and cultures (that is, multicultural). He also
points to the joyful and happy character of Brazilians despite all the suffering that was
necessary to give birth to them as a nation-ethnicity. One of the main ideas that are
reinforced throughout the book is that of the original cell that became the basis to the
formation of a Brazilian identity, born very early in the process of colonization in the
form of mestizos of Portuguese fathers and Indian mothers, that did not belong to
neither group and became a group on their own, heavily influenced by Indian manners
and traditions, but displaced from its context; African slaves, on the other hand, could
be seen as playing a major role in the affirmation of the Portuguese language as the
national language, since they came from different tribes and ethnicities and the only
way for them to communicate among themselves and with their masters was to learn
their masters language. In this way, as Brazilians were consolidated as a people very
early, the contingent of immigrants that came later were not able to destabilize the
29

identity that had been consolidating for centuries. According to Ribeiro, this process
was responsible by the fact that the social divisions of the Brazilian society are not
based on culture and ethnicity, but in deep class stratification. In this way, the
keywords here are novelty, hybridism, syncretism, homogeneity, multiculturalism,
mestizage, joy, happiness, national-ethnicity and class stratification.

30

METHODS

In order to achieve our objective of uncovering the patterns in the representation of

the Brazilian identity in foreign and national news, so we can compare the
representational practices that emerge from the different sources and read them in the
light of theories about identity, representation and Brazilian culture, this work will
apply two main strategies in the analysis of the corpus of material obtained through
sampling: content analysis and textual analysis, both adapted to best serve the
purposes of the work and to fit in its practical limitations. But before we go deeper in
the description of the method of analysis, we shall first discuss the process of
sampling.

Sampling

Since the media is a vastly broad territory and the ambition to analyze every
possible representation of Brazilian identity by either foreign or national
communication vehicles would make this research virtually impossible, we had to
reduce the scope of material by selecting particular vehicles.
First of all, in a evaluation which took into consideration mainly practical matters,
it was considered that print media would be more suitable to the limitations of time
and resources that have to be considered when developing a research, since it is
promptly available for textual analysis (as their main components are texts), more
broadly available for access in libraries and databases, easier to collect and document
than TV and radio broadcastings and have a longer life than internet news. This
choice also avoids the time-consuming process of transcription. However, it is
important to note that not only the texts are going to be taken into consideration in the
analysis, but also the visual components will be examined.
Secondly, when it comes to the origin of the communication vehicles, language
had to be taken into consideration, since, in textual analysis, translations is a
problematic element that introduces another level of interpretation. This was not a
31

problem when it comes to the national communication vehicles, since the author of
this work is a native speaker of Portuguese, trained in the Brazilian journalistic
practices, allowing the analysis to be performed in the original language and making
it necessary to translate only the results and considerations. However, when it comes
to foreign communication vehicles, the most sensible decision would be that of
choosing Anglophone media in order to avoid translations. Hence, the United States,
the main English speaking country of the world in terms of international relevance,
was chosen as the origin for the print media vehicle that will provide material for our
analysis.
In the choice of the particular vehicle of communication that will serve our
analysis, two main points were taken into consideration: the broadness of its reach
(which could also be taken in terms of their prominence in each national media
landscape) and an arguable sense of trustworthiness.
In the case of the United States, we have chosen The New York Times as our source
of data because it is the largest metropolitan newspaper in the United States, founded
in 1851 and considered to be an American institution. The newspaper has won 101
Pulitzer Prizes3, which is the largest amount among news agencies, while its website
is the leader in traffic among all online newspapers4, making the publication a central
source of information. As a well-established newspaper, which claims to give
thorough coverage of different issues and to base its contents on facts (its motto is
All the news thats fit to print), it is also considered to be credible by its large
audience.
In the case of Brazil, we chose the major metropolitan newspaper of the country,
which is based in the city of So Paulo, the biggest, richest and most influential city

The Pulizter Prize is an annual award administered by Columbia University (New York); in

the field of journalism, it evaluates achievements of United States-based news organisations since
1917. Sources: The Pulitzer Prizes (http://www.pulitzer.org), viewed on Dec. 6th 2010; Wikipedia
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulitzer_Prize), viewed on Dec. 6th 2010.
4

Source: Web Traffic to Top 10 Online Newspapers Grows 16 Percent Year-Over-Year in

December, According to Nielsen Online, Reuters (http://www.reuters.com/article/idUS147719+27Jan-2009+MW20090127), published on Jan. 27th 2009, viewed on Dec. 6th 2010.

32

of the country, considered to be the capital of economic decisions and cultural life of
Brazil: Folha de S.Paulo. Folha de S.Paulo has been the Brazilian newspaper with the
highest national circulation rates since the 1980s5.
In order to epitomize the search for representations of Brazilian identities in the
discourse of the chosen media outlets, it was considered that the occurrence of
particular events which draw attention to Brazil would be an opportunity to
concentrate the samples over a definite period of time and to collect data that could be
more relevant to the present research.
Hence, one particular recent event was selected as a focal point to the process of
sampling: the poll to elect the host city for the Olympic Games of 2016, which
occurred in 2009 with Rio de Janeiro eventually being chosen. To make this selection
useful to the purpose of limiting the material for analysis, the event was examined
throughout a whole week, in which it was positioned in the middle. The poll which
selected the host for the 2016 Olympic Games occurred on October 2nd 2009; hence,
the period examined for the collection of articles comprehended the editions
published between September 29th 2009 and October 5th 2009.
In the case of the foreign newspaper, articles published within the determined
period, which dealt directly with Brazil or Brazilian characters in the context of the
chosen event were identified and collected. In the case of the national newspaper,
further consideration was necessary, since the merely collection of articles about
Brazil and Brazilians in the context of the chosen event would mean we would have
to analyse almost all the published content. Hence, besides identifying articles directly
linked to the events chosen, a closer examination was performed in order to collect
only articles that could allow insights about the main theme of this work, that is,
Brazilian identity.

Analytical strategy

Grupo Folha triplica faturamento em dez anos e consolida liderana. Folha de S.Paulo, Feb.

th

19 2011: 90 Anos 12-13.

33

As we have mentioned before, the analysis will be guided by two main analytical
strategies, both adapted to better serve the purposes of this work: content analysis and
textual analysis.
Content analysis is taken in the sense defined by Berelson: Content analysis is a
research technique for the objective, systematic, and quantitative description of the
manifest content of communication (Berelson, 1984: 18), assuming that knowledge
of the content can legitimately support inferences about non-content events
(Berelson, 1984: 18).
In this sense, content analysis was applied in the following ways: quantitative
analysis evaluating the number of articles published during the given period of time,
the position of the articles within the issue, the position of the article within the page,
the length of the article and the amount of space it occupies in order to identify the
level of importance that is given by the publication to the matter. An adaptation of the
qualitative content analysis described by Berelson was also used, in connection
with the textual analysis, to identify and separate into categories the words and
expressions used to represent Brazilian identity and to analyze the presence-absence
of this particular kind of content.
The other analytical strategy derives from the tradition of Critical Discourse
Analysis and is based on the textual dimension of texts postulated especially by
Norman Fairclough. Fairclough points to textual analysis as his preferred method to
capture sociocultural processes in the course of their occurrence (Fairclough, 1995:
186).
Textual analysis involves the analysis of the way propositions are structured and
the way they are combined and sequenced (Fairclough, 1995b, cited in Richardson,
2007). In a critical textual analysis, the analyst examines the text in terms of what is
present and what could have been but is not present. In other words, the analyst is
concerned with the choices involved in a text.
However, considering the length of the sample (20 texts) and the limitations of
time and resources that this work has to deal with, it was considered that applying a
complete textual analysis would be both impractical and unproductive. Thus, the
34

analyst decided to focus in two particular aspects of textual analysis: the lexical
choices and inter-textuality (since, as we have seen in the Theories chapter,
representations are constructed inter-textually).
Lexical analysis, that is, the analysis of particular words used in a text, is the most
common first stage of any text or discourse analysis, because words convey the
imprint of society and of value judgments in particular (Richardson, 2007: 47). All
words, but particularly nouns, adjectives, verbs and adverbs carry connoted and
denoted meanings.
Inter-textuality is taken mostly in Halls terms (1997), as similar representational
practices and figures being repeated with variations from one text or site of
representation to another, with meaning accumulating across different texts, building
regimes of representation. Inter-textuality is also considered in the sense Fairclough
(2003) uses by linking it to the concept of assumptions, that is, what is not said in the
text, but taken as given, connecting one text to others and to the world of texts.
Considering all the above mentioned points, the analysis applied here is of a
descriptive and interpretative kind and was carried in the following way:
-

identification of the relevant articles by standards already discussed in the

Sampling section;

measuring of the articles and description of their length and the space they
occupy both in the issue and in the page;

description of other elements that were associated to the article (such as

photographs);

careful reading of every article, to identify the paragraphs in which

information relevant to the context of this research was presented;

description of the content of the paragraphs, followed by interpretation using a

lexical and inter-textual analysis;

coding of the words and expressions associated with Brazil and Brazilians to
separate them in broader categories;

35

discussion of the results obtained through the analysis in the light of the
theories about identity, representation and Brazilian identity presented in the
Theories chapter.

36

ANALYSIS

Text 1

The New York Times, Oct. 2nd 2009

Headline: The Smart Choice for Olympic Host
Placement: Business/Financial, section B, page 2 (even page)
Position in the page: top left, as part of a column called BreakingViews.com
Length: three columns wide, a third of the page in height, 729 words (the whole
BreakingViews.com column; the article that refers to the Olympic Games bid
occupies almost two thirds of the column)
Another features: a one column photograph of Michelle Obama and Oprah
Winfrey with the caption Two Chicago rooters in Copenhagen: Michelle Obama and
Oprah Winfrey.

The article is placed in the second section of the newspaper (section B), which
indicates that the matter is not one that is at the top of the hierarchical placement of
the news of the day. However, its appearance in the Business section indicates that
it is not only a sportive matter, but one that has broader implications to the
newspapers readers and producers. The article is placed in the second page of the
section, which points to the fact that it is a significant matter, however not as
important as to deserve the first page.
The convention that guides the design of newspaper pages usually see even pages
as a less privileged space, since the same convention says that readers attention is
first drawn by odd pages, that is, those in the right. However, within the design of one
page, the top left is seen as the most privileged space of the page, following the
conventional reading direction of western languages (from left to right and from top
to bottom).
37

Its length also denotes the importance given to the theme, since the article occupies
approximately one fifth of the page.
The basic subject of the article is the economic costs of hosting an Olympic game
and how the bidders are making an effort to keep the costs low.
In the paragraphs that refer to Rio de Janeiros bid, the country is portrayed as
having a poor infrastructure and as being somewhat violent, what can be inferred by
the reference to the need of public investment in transportation and security
(paragraph 7).
However, its flourishing and stable economy (that has done relatively well despite
the global slowdown, paragraph 8), its great population (which makes the cost of the
games to be better absorbed) and the fast-growing character of Rio de Janeiro are also
emphasized, leading the authors to conclude that the Brazilian bid is the one that
makes the most economic sense.
From the short part of the text that deals with Brazil, what emerges is an image of a
great country in terms of population, in the process of developing (it needs investment
in transportation and Rio is a fast-growing city), somewhat violent, and with a stable
and promising economy.

Text 2

The New York Times, Oct. 3nd 2009

Headline: Rio de Janeiro Picked to Hold 2016 Olympics (in the front cover); Rio
de Janeiro is Awarded 2016 Games; Obama Fails to Sway Voters (in the continuation
of the article, on Page D6)
Placement: cover, section A, page 1; Sports, section D, page 6
Position in the page: top left on page A1; top of page D6

38

Length: on page A1: one column wide, half a page in height, plus a four-column
photograph, almost a third of the page in height; on page D6: the whole width of the
page (five columns) and more than half of the page in height; 1420 words
Another features: on page A1, a four-column photograph of a celebrating crowd
in Rio with the caption Celebrations in Rio de Janeiro followed the announcement as
local officials declared a holiday for city and state employees; on page D6, four twocolumn photographs showing the reactions to the decision of the Olympic committee
in the four bidders cities, with the caption Brazils president, Luiz Incio Lula da
Silva, left at top left, joined in the celebration in Brazil as three other cities ached.
Spaniards in Madrid's Plaza Oriente, top right, after losing in the final round. A man
in Tokyo, above left, was inconsolable. In Chicago, above, there was disbelief at a
first-round exit.

The choice for Rio as the host of the 2016 Olympic Games was clearly the most
important news of the day, since it was placed in the most noble part of the
newspaper: the top left of the cover, the most privileged place of a page (as we
discussed earlier) which is also the first page of the newspaper, the space for
displaying the most important headlines of that days issue, the first thing that the
reader sees when he picks the newspaper.
It also has a privileged space on page D6, occupying more than half the page and
placed in its top. In this case, the fact that page D6 is an even page is not so relevant,
since the article is referred to in the cover of the newspaper and, as we will see later,
the choice of the Olympic Games host also occupies most of the section cover (page
D1) and of the following page (page D7), with emphasis being given to the newly
chosen host.
The length of the article, which begins in page A1 and continues in page D6, is
another indicator of the relevance of the matter, since it is not a current situation that
any matter is given that much space.
The structure of the article does not follow exactly the scheme of the inverted
pyramid, since the opening paragraph is not structured as a lead (answering the

39

questions what, whom, how, when, where, why), but gives a description of the scene
in which the election took place.
The main theme of the article is the voting and election process, but most of it is
dedicated to trying to find explanations to the exclusion of Chicagos bid in the very
first round of voting.
However, the sections that do refer to Brazil (and, especially, to Rio), can be seen
as particularly useful to the aims of this research.
In the first paragraph, the celebration of the Brazilian delegation after Rio won the
election is described as a a boisterous party with members in uniform navy or moss
green blazers hugging, dancing, crying and waving Brazilian flags and a yelling bid
leader. In this particular case, Brazilians are represented as noisy and energetic festive
people, very affectionate (hugging each other) and emotional (crying and
yelling). This representation is of particular relevance because of its placement in
the opening paragraph, which is usually the place for the most important information
and which receives the biggest amount of attention from the reader. The style in
which it is written, very descriptive and more similar to a narrative style than to the
traditional structure of news, also helps to amplify the effect of the image created by
the choice of words, especially when considering that right next to it is a photograph
of Brazilian people in a frenzy celebration.
Another image that can be inferred from the photograph is that of a country in
which people is not very much keen to working, since the mere election of a city to be
an Olympic host was the cause for a holiday declared by the mayor and by the state
government
Paragraph 5 brings to fore another characteristic of the Brazilian bid that could be
exacerbated as a characteristic of the country, one that was also used by the team
defending Rios bid during their presentation: the marginality of the country (and of
South America, the region where it is placed) in regard to a world order that has
privileged Europe, North America and Oceania as sites for hosting an Olympic Game.
That is made through the affirmation that the fact that South America had never
hosted an Olympic Game may have helped Rios bid and that the team involved in the
bid was aware of that and used this information in their favour.
40

The phrase South America was glaring bare (in the end of paragraph 5), which
describes a map used in Rios presentation to show the places that had already
received an Olympic Game, is a very powerful one, since the use of glaringly implies
something very obvious in a negative way and bare (which also means nude)
transmits and idea of desolation.
The next relevant reference to Rio and Brazil comes in paragraph 20, when it is
pointed that Rio declared a city holiday after the announcement of its election (maybe
suggesting a lack of inclination towards work that we already pointed in relation to
the caption of the main photograph) and describes the people participating into the
celebration, which took place at the beach and attracted tens of thousands of people,
as dressed in shorts and bikinis and jumping to samba music. As real as this
description could have been, the decision to give place to that particular information
(the way people were dressed and their behaviour) brings to fore the use of typical
stereotypes, in which Brazilians are seen as an informal, sensual and musical (in
association with samba) people.
Paragraph 29 points geography as a factor that acted in Rios favour, probably
referring to the natural beauties and tropical climate of the city. It is also noteworthy
that the same paragraph brings, next, a somewhat disconnected sentence in which it is
argued that geography helped the city overcome concerns about security (there is no
logical link between geography and security), a choice that implies a will to
emphasize that the city has issues of security to deal with. It also points to some
generic concerns (there were also concerns) about the countrys capacity to manage
two major events in a row (the Soccer World Cup in 2014 and the Olympic Games in
2016).
Paragraph 30 implies that Rio (and, by extension, Brazil) is a place that could use
some change by pointing to the tendency of the IOC (International Olympic
Committee) to try to effect change with its choices for bid cities. The idea is
followed through in paragraph 31, which explains that hosting an Olympic Game
could help Brazil develop faster.
The closing paragraph (32) portrays an important Brazilian personality (if not the
most important at that moment), the president Luiz Incio Lula da Silva in a very
emotional way (he says Today is the most emotional day of my life, the most
41

exciting day of my life). Lulas words that are chosen to be reproduced in the article
also show his pride of the country, which he sees with potential to become a great
country.

Text 3

The New York Times, Oct. 3nd 2009

Headline: A Vote for Brazil
Placement: Sports Saturday, section D, page 1
Position in the page: top
Length: five columns wide (the whole top of the page) and almost half the page in
height
Other features: with barely any text, the piece is constituted by a five column
wide and almost half a page high aerial photograph of the crowd celebrating Rios
victory in Copacabana beach, plus two small one-column photographs of details of
the crowd, with the caption A huge crowd gathered on Copacabana beach in Rio de
Janeiro for Fridays announcement. Brazil is already preparing to host soccers World
Cup in 2014

The feature is basically a headline with barely any text, calling attention to the
material that was already mentioned on the cover of the newspaper and which follow
in the same page and inside the sports section.
The positioning in the cover of the section (page D1), occupying its whole top part
and half of the page denotes the importance given by the theme and is coherent with
the appearance of a headline in the cover of that days edition.
With the absence of a particular text related to the headline, emphasis is given to
the photograph. The content of the photograph is very relevant, since it emphasizes
42

two characteristics of Brazil that are related to common stereotypes of the country: the
festive character (represented by the huge crowd celebrating Rios victory) and the
tropical character (represented by the location of the celebration, Copacabanas beach
a beach that is very representative for the imaginary of Rio , which is shown in a
panoramic way, with sand, sea mountains and street).
The small text placed above the headline and the photograph caption (which is
basically descriptive of the scene portrayed in the photograph) do not have any
relevant aspects to add to our discussion.

Text 4

The New York Times, Oct. 3nd 2009

Headline: A Great Choice, Even if Others Were Worthy (on Page D1, repeated on
Page D7)
Placement: Sports Saturday, section D, page 1; continues on page 7
Position in the page: mid left on page D1; mid left on page D7
Length: on page D1: one column and a third wide, approximately one third of the
page in height; on page D7: two columns wide, almost two thirds of the page in
height; 962 words

In the context of the newspaper issue as a whole, the article is part of a wider
ensemble, which includes texts 2 and especially 3, since the huge headline that is text
3 is placed right above text 4, forming a continuum with it. In this sense, its placement
in the middle of the page is not a sign of a minor relevance, because it is a part of a
bigger group of texts and images, which constitutes the main matter of that page and
occupies more than half of it.
In the hierarchy of page D7, the article is the third in relevance (the first one is the
one in the top left and the second is the one in the top right). However, this placement
43

in a less noble space is minimized by the fact that the article actually begins in the
cover of the section, which is a very privileged space. The length of the article is
another indicator of its significance among the matters addressed by the newspaper on
that day.
The opening paragraph (which is the most privileged space in the context of a
particular text) emphasizes the novelty of the choice of the IOC for Rio, since it is a
new city, a new country and a new continent. The repetition of the term new
related to the election of Rio as Olympic host also gives the impression that the city,
the country and the continent are new themselves, not only in relation to hosting an
Olympic Game. The first paragraph also emphasizes the previous unequal quality of
the distribution of the Olympic hosts (which can also be reflected in the inequality of
the world order in general) and the correcting component of the choice for Rio, which
make the five Olympic rings to make more sense now.
The same idea is explored in paragraphs 2 and 3, in which the author points the
IOC will to be more representative of all its members by being more democratic in
moving the Games around the world.
In paragraph 4, the election for Rio is portrayed as cosmically right and Rio is seen
as the bidder that makes most sense in the spirit of the Games, which is not always
observed by the Eurocentric urban members which dominate the IOC. In this sense,
Rio and, by extension, Brazil are put as the open-minded multicultural option, in
contrast with the Eurocentrism that usually guides IOC decisions.
Paragraph 6 emphasizes the new multicultural mentality that has been guiding the
choice for hosts of major sports events, with the use of the phrase welcome to the
world pointing to the fact that the actual world is not only made by Europe and the
US, but countries like South Africa (which hosted the last Soccer World Cup) and
Brazil.
Paragraph 7 continues the discourse about the unequal distribution of the choice
for world sporting events saying that the election of Rio showed that IOC members
agreed with president Lula statement that its was the time to correct the imbalance
among world sporting hosts. The paragraph also refers to Lulas statement about the
fact that Brazil was no longer only the country of samba, beaches and the emotional
44

soul of soccer, but also a growing and trustworthy economy. The citation of Lulass
statement, despite the positive fact of trying to show that Brazil is not only made of
stereotypes, also brings to fore the very same stereotypes, which are once again
reinforced.
Paragraph 9 mentions another stereotype of Brazil and, especially, of Rio that of
violence and lack of safety linked to unequal distribution of wealth. This idea is
evoked in the phrase the gangs in the hillside favelas, or slums, which creates a
strong image of poverty and crime. The paragraph also minimizes the argument used
by Lula that Brazil, at least, is not the target of terrorism mockiing it as part of the
fierce competition among the bidders.
Paragraph 22, which is also the closing paragraph, mentions Rios image of city
of love and mysteries as something that could make the city match its competitors
and refers to a song by the Brazilian composer Antonio Carlos Jobim as capable of
making anybody an instant Brazilian, an operation that the IOC had undertaken.
Those two mentions the image of city and love and mysteries and the song that
transforms anyone in an instant Brazilian are very powerful and have a lot to say
about how the author sees Brazil and Rio. Brazil is evoked as an exotic, sensual and
inclusive place, a country which is open to anybody, regardless of origins.

Text 5

The New York Times, Oct. 4th 2009

Headline: Rio Toasts Olympic Win
Placement: Inside the Times, section A, page 2
Position in the page: the section is placed on the top right and the specific text
about Rios election is the third one, under the heading International
Length: the whole section is four columns wide and a third of the page in height;
the small note about Brazil is one column wide and one fifth of the section in height;
37 words
45

The small note has the function of a headline, pointing to relevant matters of the
day that were not relevant enough to be placed on the cover but important enough to
deserve a mention in a different place that the one in which it is actually printed. In
this way, the mention to the celebration in Rio demonstrates that it is placed among
the most relevant issues of the day.
The short text describes the feeling that had taken the crowd celebrating Rios
election in the Copacabana beach, which is seen as the perception of something
powerful happening. It builds an image of a great party taken by the frenzy of a very
important event, in the perception of the participants.

Text 6

The New York Times, Oct. 4th 2009

Headline: Dancing Into the Evening, Brazil Celebrates Its Arrival on the World
Stage
Placement: International, section A, page 10
Position in the page: top of the page
Length: six columns wide (the whole width of the page) and between half and a
third of the page in height, occupying a little more than a third of the page; 1057
words
Other features: a three column photograph of the leader of the Brazilian bid, the
president Lula and the mayor of Rio holding the plate awarded to the bid winner, with
the caption President Luiz Incio Lula da Silva, center, with the plate awarded
Friday to Rio in Copenhagen.

The article, which is referred to in a small note on page A2 that serves as a

headline, is put among the most relevant matters of the day by this reference. In
addition, its placement in the first of the newspaper sections, which is usually
46

reserved for national political news and international news also denotes that the
matter is of international political relevance, not only relevant in the context of sports.
It is the most important article in the hierarchy of the page by its placement and
length, which also denotes that it is a relevant matter.
Already in the headline we can see a reference to a stereotype of Brazilians as a
festive people (Dancing into the evening), which is reinforced in the opening and
second paragraphs, which refer, respectively, to an early Carnival and to the sambaloving residents of Rio, who danced into the evening. The description of the
celebrations participants in paragraph 2 portrays them as informal and sensual, since
they are dressed in flip-flops and green-and-yellow bikinis.
The third paragraph goes back to an idea already present in the headline, that of the
Brazilian arrival on the world stage, denoting that, according to the author, before the
election of Rio to host the Olympics, Brazil was relegated to a minor role in the
international world order, something which is felt as powerful and promising of even
greater prosperity to the country. Note that the use of the term even points to the fact
that the country is already in a prosperous situation.
The description of one of the participants of the celebration on paragraph 4 is
another reaffirmation of the stereotypes of informality, festivity and tropicality, since
the character is described as dancing shirtless (informal and festive) under the hot
afternoon sun (tropical). The mention of the time of the celebration afternoon may
also leave the impression that Brazilians are not very keen of working, since they
dropped their activities to take part into the celebration, which attracted tens of
thousands of people. The characters statement that Brazil is solid and has it all,
despite not being the authors words, may show the authors intention to show Brazil
as a rich country (in broad terms: culturally, in terms of resources and economy,
naturally etc.).
The description of president Lula in paragraph 6 as a former auto plant worker
with a fourth-grade education whom, nevertheless, helped make Brazil an economic
and political regional leader may be a reference to the social mobility and abundance
of opportunities of the country, in which even a poorly educated worker could
become president.
47

In paragraph 7, the emotional character of the president (which could be

extrapolated to the whole of Brazilians) is brought to fore by the description of his
emotional state after the vote, crying and saying that he could die and it would already
had been worth it after bringing the Olympics to Brazil. This is made in a very
descriptive way, which makes the image even more powerful and keen to leave an
impression in the readers imagination.
The solidity of Brazils economy and political path, its growing relevance in the
international scene and Lulas protagonism in many different instances are argued fort
in paragraphs 8 and 10 through 14.
Paragraph 15 brings the statement of a lawyer that was taking part of the
celebrations, whom, always speaking collectively (by the use of the pronoun we),
declares to be very moved, revealing one more time the recurrent emotional
component of Brazilians character.
Paragraphs 16 and 17 demonstrate a somewhat scepticism towards Brazils
capacity of pulling out such a big and important event, since it overpromised projects
for the 2007 Pan-American Games and there is still lots to be done in terms of
infrastructure. This statements denote a view of Brazil as not very organised country.
Poverty is the subject of paragraphs 18 and 19, which reflect the view of opponents
to Rios bid (including internal opponents) that the resources that will be invested in
hosting the game could be better spent to relieve poverty and even to help develop
sports programs.
Paragraph 20 takes on a view that already appeared on other texts by emphasizing
Rios problems with organisation and, especially, security, which are referred to
through a very strong image: choking traffic and the citys blight and rampant
drug-fueled violence. Choking traffic passes on an image of a city being suffocated
by its heavy traffic, while blight denotes something with an evil influence and
rampant creates an image of something growing in an uncontrolled way. In this way,
the representation of Rio (and of Brazil, by extension), that emerges from this
paragraph is of a city with a very low management capacity, which, above all, is the
place of uncontrolled criminality.

48

This idea is reinforced by the use of a statement of a local worker in paragraph 21,
which says that the organisation of the Games will just make the city look good
during the Olympics without really solving the citys problems.
Paragraph 22, however, presents a contrasting point of view in the voice of a
political analyst who sees the Games as an opportunity to reform the city, reduce
poverty and improve the country. Note that, while the statement is pretty much
optimistic, it points again to some of the negative ways of representing Brazil the
need of more organisation, poverty and the need to improve thus foregrounding
them once again.
Paragraph 23, already close to the end of the article, brings us again to the
celebration on Copacabana beach, where enthusiasm seems not to be ruined by any
fears or reservations. The paragraph is also another opportunity for the author to
reinforce more recurring stereotypes: Brazilians are carefree (they were celebrating
despite any possible concern), sensual/passionate (couples kissed passionately) and
festive (the kisses happened between sips of beer), in another association with
samba music (the drum corps of samba school whipped the crowd into a frenzy).
Note that, while we have referred to the kind of image the texts examined made of the
celebration on Copacabana beach using the term frenzy, it is the first time so far that it
appears in the article itself. The term, which, according to the Cambridge Dictionary,
means uncontrolled and excited behaviour or emotion, which is sometimes violent,
is one of strong imaging potential, especially in association with the verb whip, which
creates an image of music forcing people into uncontrolled behaviour. From that
image we can extract a representation of Brazilians as uncontrolled festive people,
driven more by the rhythm of the music than by their own will.
Paragraph 24 and 25 brings more enthusiastic statements of another Rio local,
which says that this is the moment of Brazil against a background in which three
slightly drunk people chant Bra-zil!, once again reinforcing the carefree festive
character of Brazilians.

Text 7

49

The New York Times, Oct. 4th 2009

Headline: Last of the Great Cities
Placement: Week in Review, section WK, page 5
Position in the page: top left
Length: four columns wide and almost two thirds of the page in height, occupying
a little less than half the page; from this, almost a third refers directly to Rio de
Janeiro; 292 words
Other features: a two column photograph of Chicagos skyline with the caption
The Chicago skyline, dominated by Willis Tower, the tallest building in the United
States.

The article, from which only one section refers to Rio, is placed on the top left of
an odd page, which is a very privileged space. However, it is not of extreme
relevance, since it is not placed in the cover of the section and the section itself is not
the most privileged one in the newspaper, title that is reserved to the first section.
The article is a collection of texts previously published in The New York Times
itself or elsewhere, regarding various matters, being the first two about Chicago and
Rio, two cities that were bidders to the 2016 Olympics.
In the text referring to Rio, which is a piece by a former correspondent of the
newspaper in Brazil, published two years earlier in the Travel section, the author
gives advices to tourists coming to Rio for the Pan-American Games.
The headline already points to the main theme of the text: A Dangerous Beauty.
Safety issues that may concern visitors of Rio are treated throughout the article, which
second paragraph presents Rio as a stunning place, nestled between verdant
mountains and an azure sea, giving a very peaceful and tender image of this tropical
city (especially through the use of nestle, which gives a sense of something sheltered
and protected) to immediately subvert it by pointing that it has many problems for
visitors, especially regarding safety.

50

Paragraph 3 is a sequence of negative images of Rio regarding violence: Rio is

crime-ridden, quite violent, populated by heavily-armed gangs that control the
hillside squatter slums known as favelas, which are growing increasingly bolder in
their assaults and threats. Crime-ridden creates an image of a city controlled by
crime; heavily-armed gangs is a powerful and frightening image; hillside squatter
slums create an image of poverty and illegality; and increasingly bolder passes
through the idea of gangs that do not fear the police and the other law enforcement
mechanisms. All those images put together create a desolate scene of a city dominated
by crime and violence.
Paragraph 4 refers in a somewhat ironic way to authorities reassuring statements in
which they try to dissipate the concerns a bout security.
The closing paragraphs provides the potential tourist with some practical
guidelines when visiting Rio, all of which reinforce the idea of an unsafe place, where
it is necessary to be careful and it is not advisable to display expensive possessions
and to walk alone, closing the general picture of a very violent and unsafe place.

Text 8

Folha de S.Paulo, Set. 29th 2009

Headline: A geopolitical shift may guide Lulas speech [Guinada geopoltica deve
nortear discurso de Lula]
Placement: Sport, section D, page 1
Position in the page: mid to bottom right
Length: two columns wide, almost half the page in height, 322 words
Another features: the article is placed in a page that is entirely dedicated to the
election of the 2016 Olympic host; right above it there is a picture of the place in
Copenhagen where the vote would take place, with the caption Danish policemen
make a security check around Bella Center, in the Danish capital, which will receive
51

the election for the host of 2016 Olympics [Policiais dinamarqueses fazem
checagem de segurana em volta do Bella Center, na capital dinamarquesa, que
receber a eleio da sede da Olimpada de 2016]

The matter is clearly one of great significance in the newspaper evaluation, since it
occupies the whole cover of the Sport section and deserved a mention on the cover of
the newspaper. However, inside the hierarchy of the page, the article in question can
be said to be of secondary relevance, since it is placed in a not so noble part of the
page. Nevertheless, as a part of a broader context, it does not lose that much in
significance and we cannot forget as well that it is placed in the cover of the section.
The main subject of the article is the participation of the Brazilian president in the
campaign for Rio and in the presentation during the Olympic Sessions in
Copenhagen.
The headline as well as paragraph 6 present what should be the tone of Lulas
speech, that is, the need to make a geopolitical shift and bring the Olympics to a
developing country. This developing character of Brazil is emphasized once again by
the mention, in paragraph 7, that Lula has frequently repeated this information in
interviews.

Text 9

Folha de S.Paulo, Set. 29th 2009

Headline: US magazine shows Rio at the mercy of gangs [Revista dos EUA
mostra Rio merc de gangues]
Placement: Sport, section D, page 2
Position in the page: top, middle to right of the page
Length: four columns wide, between one and two thirds of the page in height,
occupying roughly one third of the page, 597 words
52

Another features: there are two citations from the original piece published in the
New Yorker magazine: Rio de Janeiro is the city that occupies the first place in the
international ranking of violent deaths [O Rio de Janeiro a cidade que ocupa o
primeiro lugar no ranking de mortes violentas intencionais]; According to any basis
for calculation, public security in Rio de Janeiro is a disaster [Segundo qualquer
base de clculo, a segurana pblica no Rio de Janeiro um desastre]

In the page, the article is the first in relevance, since the piece that comes in the top
left is a fixed section that always occupies the same spot. To reinforce this idea, there
is the fact that the headline of the article is the biggest in the whole page. That denotes
the high significance the newspaper gives to the American magazine account on Rio,
which is also referred to in small headlines in the cover of the newspaper and in the
cover of the section (page D1).
The main aim of the text is to give a summary of the article on Rio published in a
prestigious American magazine. Despite the fact that the text mostly reproduces the
content of the original article, it is noteworthy that, by the placement and length of the
text, the matter is given a very serious treatment. The author does not judge or tries to
respond to the information presented in the New Yorker article, which may leave to
the reader a sense that the information presented there corresponds to the reality of
Rio.
In paragraph 1, the New Yorker is presented as a respected magazine and the
author of the piece, Jon Lee Anderson, is presented in paragraph 4 as a prestigious
journalist, giving even more credibility to the reported information.
The image of Rio as a violent place dominated by drug dealing gangs begins to be
formed already in the headlines and sub-headlines, which bring powerful images such
as a place at the mercy of gangs, where the State is absent, with high death rates.
The image is reinforced again in paragraph 2, where the same information is
presented once again.
Paragraph 3 emphasizes the title given to the New Yorker report: Gangland.
Who control Rio de Janeiros streets?, which reinforces once again the image of a
place taken over by criminality.
53

Paragraph 5 builds a contrast between the representation of Rio in the American

magazine and the strategy of the campaign for hosting the 2016 Olympics, which
explores Rios natural beauties and the success of the public security policies. Note
that the paragraph points another, however contrasting, stereotype of Rio (and Brazil
by extension): its tropicality, translated in the natural beauties.
Paragraph 8 creates a gloomy image of generalized poverty by citing Andersons
estimate that there are more than a thousand favelas (hillside slums) in Rio and by
reporting his article affirmation that is virtually impossible to completely escape
penury in Rio. Completing the gloomy image, in paragraphs 9 to 11 the author points
to Andersons account of the regime under which most of the favelas live under,
which is ruled by the gangs, and also to the structuring and formation of such gangs.
The absence of the State is emphasized once again in paragraph 13, which also
points to the comparison made by Anderson between the violent death rates in Rio
and in the US, a comparison that is continued in paragraph 14, which points to the
fact that the number of daily killings by Rios police is superior to the numbers of the
whole United States.
Paragraphs 15 to 16 give voice to the police chief that was listened by Anderson in
his article, which is reported as having said that the situation in Rio is not one of
calamity and that the police is able to control any region of the city they want to, even
though they cannot stay there to finish the job.
This article is particularly interesting by the fact that it is an account of another
article published in a foreign magazine. The fact that it is a type of summary means
that the author selected and presented the ideas that she judged to be more relevant in
the original article. In this way, the image of Rio (and, by extension, of Brazil) that
emerges from the text, through the eyes of a foreigner, is also the image the Brazilian
journalist makes of the way the American journalist represents Brazil. In this sense, it
is a representation of a representation. Nevertheless, it is noteworthy that Rio comes
out of this mirrored representation as a violent and unsafe place, dominated by
poverty and crime and where there is barely any organisation from the part of the
State.

54

Text 10

Folha de S.Paulo, Set. 30th 2009

Headline: Candidates use from jokes to drumming [Candidata usa de piada a
batuque]
Placement: Sport, section D, page 1
Position in the page: middle of the page
Length: one column wide, half the page in height, 597 words
Another features: the article is part of a bigger group of articles on the election
for Olympic host that occupies the whole page; right above it there is a four column
photograph of Rios team with the caption Isabel Swan, Eduardo Paes, Srgio
Cabral, Carlos Arthur Nuzman, Ricardo Leyser and Carlos Roberto Osrio, from Rio16, in Copenhagen [Isabel Swan, Eduardo Paes, Srgio Cabral, Carlos Arthur
Nuzman, Ricardo Leyser e Carlos Roberto Osrio, da Rio-16, em Copenhague]

As we have said before, the matter of the election for the 2016 Olympic host is
considered to be a very relevant one by the newspaper, since, in the dates analyzed so
far, it deserved the whole cover of the Sport section and even some mentions in the
cover of the newspaper. The same thing happens here, with the text we are going to
analyze being a part of a group of texts that occupy page D1, all of them dealing with
the Olympic election. In the context of the page, the article in question is of minor
significance, since it is placed in a not very privileged space (the middle of the page)
and its headline is the one that is less emphasized (its letters are smaller and in a
lighter color than the other headlines of the page).
Despite not being the most important text on the page, the article is relevant to our
investigation of the representation of the Brazilian identity, since it deals with the
strategies of the bidders to cast votes, which can be revealing of their character and,
especially, of the image they intend to pass on.

55

Already in the headline, which refers to some of the strategies Brazilians used, we
can see two common stereotypes of Brazil: humor (related to an informal and carefree
spirit) and musicality (linked to a festive spirit).
Paragraph 2 reinforces this image of humor and musicality by bringing a
description of Rios presentation to journalists, in which the governor of the state of
Rio makes a pun saying that Rio is the Obama of this election while Rios mayor
drums in the table with his fingers to the rhythm of Cidade Maravilhosa, a song that
describes the wonders of Rio, which was used in a promotional video. The natural
beauties of Rio are emphasized once again in paragraph 3, in which it is reported the
statement of the candidate presenter that, besides the Olympic installations, the rest of
the setting that was being shown in images of the city was real.

Text 11

Folha de S.Paulo, Oct. 1st 2009

Headline: Support to Rio [Apoio ao Rio]
Placement: Opinion, section A, page 2
Position in the page: top left
Length: two columns wide, almost half the page in height, 442 words

The texts relevance is demonstrated by its positioning as the first in hierarchy (top
left) in the page of the newspapers dedicated to opinions. It is also noteworthy that it
is the first of the two editorials presented in that days issue, which is the space that
reflect the opinion of the newspaper itself, meaning that, among all the issues that
could have deserved that space, the heads of the newspaper decide that defending
Rios bid was the most relevant thing to do.
The opening paragraph gives a brief description of Rio which has been the
capital of the country for almost two centuries emphasizing its historical, political
56

and cultural relevance, its natural beauties and the critic and optimistic spirit of its
residents. The paragraph also points to the fact that Rio has been consecrated as a
kind of symbol of Brazil, which leads us to conclude that the mentioned
characteristics (natural beauties and the critic and optimistic spirit of the residents,
which we could translate into an image of tropicality and low self-steam mixed with a
joyful character) can be extrapolated to the whole country.
Paragraph 2 describes that the possible election of Rio as the 2016 Olympics host
is a chance for Brazilians to demonstrate to themselves and to the world that the
country can face its new challenges. That affirmation can be read as pointing to need
to overcome a low self-steam and to prove its value in a global landscape as well as
internally.
Paragraph 3 deals with the argument that the persistent social inequalities of Brazil
make it inappropriate for the country to host such an important event. The fact that
Brazil is a very socially unequal country is not denied. However, it is contrasted with
the growing international projection of the country and its political and economic
stability.
Paragraph 4 argues for Rios bid by stating that the event could serve as an impulse
for development in areas in which the country needs improvements, such as
infrastructure and security, while paragraphs 5 and 6 points to a trace usually
associated with Brazilian politics and which deserves attention: corruption.
Paragraph 8 once again shows support for Rios bid by seeing in it a chance to
recover the city from a process of degradation which is visible in environmental
pollution, growth of favelas and urban violence.
The image of Rio and Brazil that emerges from this text is that of a tropical place,
which lacks in organization (for the existence of corruption, the persisting violence
and the need to perfect the infrastructure), where poverty is all over, with a people
that is both optimist and lacking in self-steam.

Text 12

57

Folha de S.Paulo, Oct. 1st 2009

Headline: Rio
Placement: Opinion, section A, page 2
Position in the page: bottom middle
Length: two columns wide, a little more than a fourth of the page in height, 300
words

In this specific case, the positioning and the length of the text is not relevant, since
it is a column with a fixed placement in the bottom of page A2 and a fixed length as
well. The choice of the theme by the columnist is not of great significance as well,
since he is based in Rio himself and his columns are always linked to the city. Hence,
we shall pass directly to the examination of its content.
The opening paragraph is structured in the form of lead, bringing the most relevant
factual information about the matter (what? The election of the 2016 Olympics host;
when? Tomorrow), functioning as an introduction to the later reasoning of the author.
In the second paragraph, the author emphasizes Rios charms as its main
advantage, which, despite the problems, is a natural brand. Paragraph 3 brings past
successes in organizing major events as a proof of the cities capacity.
Paragraph 5 argues that hosting an Olympic Game has a huge economic and
political relevance, which, as stated in paragraph6, can well serve Brazils aspirations
to be come an international power. To finalize, the author points that Brazil is a new
giant which has everything to develop a career in the international setting.
Hence, the representation of Rio and Brazil that come out from this article is that
of a charming place and promising new world power.

Text 13

58

Folha de S.Paulo, Oct. 2nd 2009

Headline: Lula sells his own sucesses to voters [Lula vende seu prprio
sucesso aos eleitores]
Placement: Sports, section D, page 2
Position in the page: top left
Length: two columns wide, from almost the whole page to a fourth of the page in
height, occupying roughly a quarter of the page, 474 words
Other features: the article is placed in a set of two facing pages entirely dedicated
to the election of the 2016 Olympic host; to the right of the article there are one
drawing of how one of the Olympic installations in Rio would look like and a three
column photograph of the ex-soccer player Pel greeting the king of Spain, which is
actually directly connected to the text right bellow it.

The placement of the article indicates that it is the most relevant in the set of pages,
which its headline being the one that immediately draws the readers attention. The
matter of the Olympic election is also among the most important of the day, since it
deserves being mentioned in the cover of the newspaper and the cover of the Sport
section is entirely dedicated to it.
The overall subject of the article in question is president Lula participation in Rios
campaign, with the two sub-headlines pointing to his insistence in the recent exits of
the Brazilian economy.
The opening paragraph presents Lula in a somewhat humorous way as the toprated Brazilian product abroad, something that could be read as a process of
personalization of characteristics of Brazil in the person of Lula.
The second paragraph describes Lulas activities of the day, during which he
compared his own personal history of overcoming difficulties (as a poor worker that
become president) with Rios bid to host the Olympics, operating another process of
personalization.

59

Lulas statement reproduced in paragraph 3 creates a very positive image of Brazil

as a country that is very certain about its future, with a self-steam that is higher now
because of the certainty that Brazil is living a magic moment.
Paragraphs 9 and 10 reinforce the optimistic image of Brazil other statements by
Lula in which he points that Brazils economy is in a better situation than that of
several developed countries, also in terms of job rates, and emphasizes the changes
his government promoted in foreign affairs policies which, according to him, were
changes in the world political geography.
Paragraphs 11 and 12 (the closing paragraph) retells Lulas appropriation of
Obamas campaign slogan Yes, we can in reference to Rios bid and in opposition
to what the president put as the current habit of Brazilians to say no, we cant,
which can reflect the image of a country with low self-steam, which only now is
starting to revert it.

Text 14

Folha de S.Paulo, Oct. 3rd 2009

Headline: 2016 Olympics will be in Rio [Olimpadas de 2016 ser no Rio]
Placement: cover, section A, page 1
Position in the page: top of the page
Length: six columns wide, approximately two thirds of the page in height,
occupying roughly two thirds of the page, 278 words
Other features: the article is accompanied by two photographs: one in the top of
the of the page, in six columns, showing the crowd celebrating Rios victory in
Copacabana Beach, with the centre of the picture being occupied by a woman holding
a Brazilian flag, with the caption In Copacabana Beach, around 50 thousand people
celebrate the victory of Rio [Na praia de Copacabana, cerca de 50 mil pessoas
festejam a vitria do Rio]; a second photograph, placed bellow the headline, showing
60

the Brazilian team celebrating the announcement in Copenhagen, with the caption
Nuzman (raised arms), Paulo Coelho, Lula, Srgio Cabral and Eduardo Paes
celebrate the selection [Nuzman (braos erguidos), Paulo Coelho, Lula, Srgio
Cabral e Eduardo Paes celebram a escolha].

The text in question is the main headline in that day cover (something that we can
infer by its positioning in the most noble space of the cover), showing that the matter
was considered by the newspaper as the most significant of the day, which can also be
inferred by the amount of articles dedicated to the subject in that day edition. The
presence of two photographs related to the matter also reinforces the importance of
the issue.
The two photographs are also very much revealing of an image of Brazilians that
have already appeared in many texts we analyze. The first image, which shows the
crowd in Copacabana, shows a celebration in which thousands of people participate,
reinforcing the festive character of Brazilians. It also reinforces the carefree image,
since all these people are at the beach, dressed in their swimming suits, shirtless or in
their sleeveless shirts. It brings a new factor to the stereotypes of Brazilians we have
been collecting so far: the ethnical variety, which can be assessed by the diversity of
the people taking part in the celebration, which included whites, blacks, mulattos and
even an woman of Asian features, in the first plane. The second picture, on its part,
shows the Brazilian delegation in a frenzy celebration, jumping and screaming in the
auditory where an official ceremony was taking place, once again reinforcing the
image of a carefree festive people.
The second headline, which says Lula cries and says he had one of his most
exciting days helps to emphasize the stereotype of Brazilians as an emotional by
portraying the countries president as crying and excited. The same image is reinforced
in paragraph 2, which also reports a statement by Lula in which he refers to the
common attitude in Brazil of thinking small because its past as a colony, which
denotes a low self-steam caused by the past as a country dominated by another nation.

Text 15
61

Folha de S.Paulo, Oct. 3rd 2009

Headline: Happy city [Cidade feliz]
Placement: Option, section A, page 2
Position in the page: botton middle
Length: two columns wide, a little more than a fourth of the page in height, 304
words

In this specific case, as it already happened with another column we examined, the
positioning and the length of the text is not relevant, since it is a column with a fixed
placement in bottom of page A2 and a fixed length as well. The choice of the theme
by the columnist is not of great significance as well, since he is based in Rio himself
and his columns are always linked to the city.
The author opens the text with a description of something he once wrote in a book
comparing Londoners, Parisians and Cariocas (the residents of Rio), which he claims
to be a people proud of its knowledge of bars (botequins), flip-flops (sandlia de
dedo), beach tennis (frescobol), bean soup (caldinho de feijo) and giving
nicknames to people. This is a powerful image that appeals strongly to the imaginary
of the Brazilian reader by evocating some of the stereotypes we have already dealt
with: a festive, informal and carefree people (bars, flip-flops, beach tennis and
nicknames) and by introducing a culinary aspect that is related to our Portuguese
cultural inheritance which was later affected by the influence of the African culture in
the ways it is prepared and consumed here (hence, a multicultural dish).
Paragraph 3 brings to fore the joyful character of Cariocas (and of Brazilians, by
extension), since Rio received the title of happiest city in the world, according to an
American research, and was considered the best gay destiny in the world. The last
sentence of paragraph 3, along with paragraph 4, seen to try to validate Rios
relevance in the international and national scenario by mentioning that it was the first
South American city to have a Michelin Guide dedicated to it and that it is an
62

important centre of academic researches in many areas. According to the author, all
that put together makes us understand why Brazilians self-steam has been rising
lately, despite having been beaten so much.

Text 16

Folha de S.Paulo, Oct. 3rd 2009

Headline: Grown up [Gente grande]
Placement: Especial, page 1
Position in the page: top
Length: six columns wide, a third of the page in height, occupying a third of the
page, 474 words
Other features: a four column photograph of the crowd in Copacabana right after
the announcement that Rio had been chosen as Olympic host, with a woman
screaming of joy in the first plane, with the caption Crowd formed by around 50
thousand people in Copacabana celebrates the choice for Rio to host 2016 Games, in
yesterdays party [Multido de cerca de 50 mil pessoas em Copacabana
comemoram a escolha do Rio para sediar os Jogos de 2016, na festa de ontem]

The relevance of the matter to the newspaper is once again reinforced by the
publishing of a whole special section on the subject (with a reference to it in the cover
of the newspaper), from which cover the text we are going to analyze comes. The text
is the only one in the cover of the special section, which is a clear sign of its
relevance.
The headline grown up points to the emancipation of Brazil in the world
scenario, something that reinforced by the sub-headlines, which emphasize the fact
that Rio beat first world cities, classifies the decision as historic and quotes Lulas
statement that the victory of Rio makes Brazil become a first class country. Saying
63

that Brazil becomes first class implies that, before, Brazil was a second (or even third)
class country.
Paragraphs 3 and 4 emphasize the growing importance of Brazil, as it will become
a sportive centre for the next decade and it has been obtaining good results in
economy and foreign affairs. The end of paragraph 4 refers to Brazils mongrel
complex (complexo de vira-lata), which is an expression created by a the Brazilian
playwright Nelson Rodrigues in the 1950s to refer to the sense of inferiority in
relation to other peoples that frequently dominate Brazilians perceptions of
themselves. This inferiority complex is reportedly referred to by Lula as something
that has been just buried with the election of Rio.
The idea of the end of Brazils low self-steam is resumed in paragraph 5, which
quotes Lulas statement in which he says that Brazil conquered the international
citizenship and that we broke the last prejudice.
The closing paragraph comes back once again to the subject, stating that the
argument used to convince the IOC to bring the Olympics to South America for the
first time was the change it would bring to the country, which already was showing its
effects, since it minimized the trauma and changed the discourse of Brazils
inferiority, its mongrel complex.

Text 17

Folha de S.Paulo, Oct. 3rd 2009

Headline: Cry-baby, Lula exchanges tension for tears [Choro, Lula troca
tenso por lgrimas]
Placement: Especial, page 2
Position in the page: top
Length: six columns wide, between a fourth of the page and the whole page in
height, occupying a little less that half of the page, 474 words
64

Other features: three photographs occupying five columns, forming a sequence of

Lula during the press conference, with the caption President Lula gets emotional and
is brought to tears during the IOC and the Brazilian team press conference right after
the announcement of Rios selection, in Copenhagen [O presidente Lula se
emociona e vai s lagrimas durante a entrevista coletiva do COI e da equipe brasileira
logo aps o anncio da escolha do Rio, em Copenhague]

The article is the second in relevance in the whole special section, since it is the
second one to appear in the section. The use of the photographs of Lula crying and
drying his face, together with the headline, gives emphasizes to the emotional reaction
of Lula, which is very representative, since he is the most important personality of the
country.
The opening paragraph builds a strong image with the description of Lulas
behaviour right before he spoke, during the interview: a tissue being taken several
times to his face, puffy face and red eyes, all characteristics of someone who has been
crying and felt very strongly touched by what had just happened.
In paragraphs 2 to 4, this emotional feature is reinforced by Lulas statements that
it was maybe his most exciting day so far, that, with all he has lived, he thought that
he did not have any reason for being so moved, that he was the one crying the most
and that he could not stop crying when he looked to a young athlete and saw her
crying. This image is resumed in paragraph 6, where Lula is reported to say Lets
leave a little time for emotion today, while grabbing a Brazilian flag and hugging the
other members the Brazilian delegation, with tears coming to his eyes once again.
Paragraphs 14 to 15 give a picture of the celebration that burst in the auditory
when the name of Rio was announced, with people screaming, climbing into chairs,
crying and even swearing. That image reinforces the idea of Brazilians as an informal
and festive people, which are not very keen of conventions of formality.

Text 18

65

Folha de S.Paulo, Oct. 3rd 2009

Headline: Celebration has protests, state souvenirs and even shortage of draft
beer [Festa tem protesto, suvenir estatal e at falta de chope]
Placement: Especial, pages 18 and 19
Position in the page: top
Length: 9 columns wide (taking both pages), half a page in height, occupying half
of the two pages
Other features: a sequence of five photographs occupying six columns,
portraying the crowd watching the IOC session in Copacabana beach and the
celebration after the announcement, with the captions Explosion of joy in
Copacabana beach in the moment in which Rio won the Games; The expectation of
the supporters in Rio de Janeiro moments before the announcement of the Olympic
host in Denmark; Anticipated Carnival in the city to celebrate Rios achievement;
Before, faith in the selection of Rio after, party for the first Olympics in South
America [Exploso de alegria na praia de Copacabana no momento em que o Rio
ganhou os Jogos; Expectativa da torcida no Rio de Janeiro a instantes do anncio da
sede olmpica na Dinamarca; Carnaval antecipado na cidade para festejar o triunfo
carioca; Antes, f na escolha do Rio... ...depois, festa pela primeira Olimpada na
Amrica do Sul]

A significant space is given to the celebration of Rios selection, which occupies

two pages in the especial section dedicated to Rios election for Olympic host.
However, it is not the text that interests us, but the sequence of images that occupy
half of the space dedicated to the piece.
Besides showing the emotional reaction of the crowd to the announcement, they
are representative of some other aspects that are usually linked to the representation of
Brazilians. Those aspects are a festive character (which can be seen in four of the five
photographs, especially the one on the top right, which shows people in Carnival
costumes of a parrot and Carmen Miranda, also denoting a tropical character),
religiosity (in the image in the mid bottom, which shows a woman with an image of a
66

saint stuck to her forehead), sensuality (especially in the photo on the bottom right, in
which a couple dances in a sensual way), informality (by the way people are dressed
especially the dancing girl in her bikini) and a mixed multi-ethnicity (by the diversity
of skin colours and characteristics of the people that appear on the pictures).

Text 19

Folha de S.Paulo, Oct. 4th 2009

Headline: With the Olympics, Brazil may overcome mongrel complex [Com
a Olimpada, Brasil pode superar vira-latice]
Placement: Sport, section D, page 4
Position in the page: mid top of the page
Length: 4 columns wide, whole page in height, occupying two thirds of the page;
855 words
Other features: a four-column photograph right above the text, showing a meeting
of the IOC Congress, in Copenhagen, with the caption Olympic spirit: Image of the
Coubertin baron is projected during the 13th Congress of the International Olympic
Committee, an event that was not held in the last 15 years and which counts with the
presence of UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon, and of members of the IOC, in
Copenhagen [Esprito olmpico: Imagem do baro de Coubertin projetada durante
o 13o Congresso do Comit Olmpico Internacional, evento no realizado nos ltimos
15 anos e que conta com a presena do secretrio-geral da ONU, Ban Ki-moon, e de
integrantes do COI, em Copenhague]; a graphic showing what the last Olympic hosts
gained and lost

The positioning of the article in the top of the page, with the biggest headline and
right bellow a picture shows that it is the most relevant on that page, even though it is
not the most important of the Sport section, since it only appears on page D4. The
67

length (which is the greatest among all the articles from the Brazilian newspaper
analyzed so far) also indicates that the issue was considered to deserve broad
attention.
The overall subject of the article is the apparent overcoming of the Brazilian
inferiority complex that seems to have followed Rios election to host the 2016
Olympic Games. The headline and sub-headlines refer directly to the possible selfsteam rise that may be the effect of the election, thus emphasizing that Brazilians
suffer from a chronic low self-steam.
Paragraphs 1 and 2 go in the same direction by quoting Lulas statement that Brazil
was not a second class country anymore and by referring to specialists who say that
Lulas statement symbolize a process of international projection of Brazil and help
feed the jingoistic spirit which dominated speeches of the Brazilian delegation in
Copenhagen.
Paragraphs 4 to 7 argue that the improve in the Brazilian self-steam has been
happening for already some time before the choice of Rio for Olympic host, due to an
improve in economic and social conditions and to the consolidation of Brazil as a
regional leader, with a strong economy and more power to participate in international
negotiations.
Paragraphs 8 to 11, on the other hand, argue that hosting an important international
sports event was used as a strategy for many countries which intended to affirm
themselves in the international scenario, and that Brazil is trying to do the same.
Paragraph 14, however, is a little less enthusiastic by using a specialist statement to
affirm that Brazil is not an international power yet, despite having a better position in
the world.
Paragraphs 15, and 17 to 19 point to the skepticism that runs beside the jingoistic
spirit towards Rios Olympics, caused by the fear that the country may not be able to
organize the event and actually profit from it.
Paragraph 20 to 22 reinforce the image of Brazilians as a people of low self-steam
by pointing to the risk that inferiority complex may come back even with the
successful organisation of the Olympics, since it is very unlikely that Brazil will
68

become a sport power, capable of wining many medals, until then. Paragraphs 23 and
24 point that it was exactly an sport failure that first inspired the creation of the
expression mongrel complex, when Brazil lost to Uruguay in the finals of the 1950
Soccer World Cup.

Text 20

Folha de S.Paulo, Oct. 5th 2009

Headline: Our Misha [O nosso Misha]
Placement: Opinion, section A, page 2
Position in the page: mid top of the page
Length: 2 columns wide, a quarter of the page in height, 312 words

In this specific case, as it already happened with a couple of other columns we

examined, the positioning and the length of the text is not relevant, since it is a
column with a fixed placement in the bottom of page A2 and a fixed length as well.
The choice of the theme by the columnist, however, is significant, since he is a
political commentator, which implies that the election of Rio is of political
significance.
The articles main subject is the idea that Lula has become the new mascot of the
international community, comparing him to the bear that was the mascot of Moscows
Olympics in 1980.
In paragraph 3, the idea of Lula as a mascot is clarified by the authors argument
that Lula is the human face of the capitalist world.
Paragraph 4 brings a series of stereotypes about Brazilians that, according to the
author, are seen by the world in the figure of Lula: informality, emotionalism,
effusiveness and spontaneous sensitivity. A couple of other characteristics that are not
69

widely reproduced are present as well: trustworthiness (inspired by our wellbehaved economic policies) and self-irony, exemplified by the propagation of the
phrase Yes, we cru, a humorous parody of Yes, we can.
Paragraph 5 brings to fore another common stereotype of Brazil (and, especially,
Rio) the favelas, which stand for poverty , and points to the failed attempt to
transform the social tragedy in a kind of poetics of the slums, which was doomed
by the rise of drug-related criminality (another stereotype about Rio).
Paragraph 7 portrays the Olympic promises as a new type of the native myth of
soccer as a magic vehicle for social climbing, which is related to the stereotype of
Brazil as the country of soccer, while paragraph 8 closes the article with a powerful
ironic image: Under the open arms of Christ the Redeemer [Cristo Redentor, the
monument in Rio], only sport saves.

70

DISCUSSION

The New York Times

QUANTITATIVE RESULTS

In the period comprehended between September 29th 2009 and October 5th 2009,
The New York Times published seven texts that were directly connected to Brazil in
the context of the choice of the 2016 Olympic Games host. From these seven texts,
one was a small note, which served as a headline calling attention to an article in
another page, and two texts begun in one page and continued in a different page, with
headlines in both. Hence, for quantitative purposes, we shall consider the number of
total texts to be eight.
The division of articles into the different sections of the newspaper was spread in
the following way:
-

12,5% (1) were placed in the Business section;

12,5% (1) were placed in the cover of the newspaper;

50% (4) were placed in the Sports section;

12,5% (1) were placed in the Week in Review weekly section.

Thus, we can conclude that the matter of Rio being a bidder (which was eventually
chose) for hosting the Olympics is not only of sportive relevance, but was also
considered by the newspaper as of political and economic relevance.
From these eight articles, 75% (6) were placed in the noblest space of the pages in
which they appeared, that is, top left, pointing to their significance in the context of
the issues in which they were published.
In average, they occupied a third of the page, which is a considerable length for a
newspaper article and constitutes another indicator of the significance of the matter to
that particular publication.
71

QUALITATIVE RESULTS

The analysis of the texts from The New York Times, undertaken with special
attention to the terms and expressions associated with Brazil and Brazilians, provided
us with some images that were repeated in many of them and which also are
commonly associated with representations of Brazil, specially in an international
context.
In this inter-textual context, the most noteworthy aspect associated to Brazil and
Brazilians by the texts in The New York Times was the festive character of the
Brazilian people. This aspect was identifiable in 11 occasions, especially in relation to
the celebration that took place in Copacabana and to the reaction of the Brazilian
delegation after the announcement of Rio as the host of the 2016 Olympics.
The celebration in Rio was associated with samba music (which is a commonly
emphasized trace of Brazilian culture) and dancing, described as an early Carnival
(another commonly emphasized trace of Brazilian culture) and as a frenzy party that
continued through the night. The reaction of the Brazilian delegation in Copenhagen,
in its part, is described as having turning the room into a boisterous [noisy, energetic
and rough] party.
Another relevant aspect that emerged from the analysis of The New York Times
articles is the representation of Brazil as a marginal country that only recently has
arrived to a more significant positional in the international scenario, which had seven
references. This is brought to fore by affirmations such as that the choice for Rio
could help the country develop faster and that the selection of Rio confirmed the
countrys arrival onto the world stage.
In the third place in terms of significance come the representations of Brazilians as
affectionate and emotional people, which appeared in six occasions. Members of the
Brazilian delegation in Copenhagen are portrayed hugging, crying and yelling and
even the president of the country is shown with his face wet in tears.

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Other aspect of the representation of Brazil that also appeared in six occasions was
the violence of the country, especially of Rio. There are references to the drug-related
criminality of the city in terms which create very powerful images, such as the city's
urban blight and rampant drug-fueled violence and the heavily-armed gangs that
control the hillside squatter slums known as favelas, making this a very strong
stereotype, despite its relatively not high rate of occurrence.
In smaller but still significant number of appearances there were the representation
of lack of organisation, recent economic development, informality, sensuality,
tropicality and social inequality.
The countrys assumed openness to other cultures (multiculturality) only appears
in two occasions, by the argument that Rio was the city that made more sense to the
spirit of the Olympic Games and by the reference to a song which will make
anybody an instant Brazilian.

Folha de S.Paulo

QUANTITATIVE RESULTS

In the period comprehended between September 29th 2009 and October 5th 2009,
Folha de S.Paulo published 13 texts that were directly connected to Brazil in the
context of the choice of the 2016 Olympic Games host and also brought issues that
were significant to the examination of Brazilian identity.
The division of articles into the different sections of the newspaper was spread in
the following way:
-

38,5% (5) were placed in the Sport section;

30,7% (4) were placed in the Opinion section;

7,7% (1) were placed in the Cover of the newspaper;

23,1% (3) were placed in a special section dedicated entirely to Rios election.

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Since we did not analyze all the articles that were related to Rios election, only
those that provided insights into Brazilian identity, we cannot judge properly their
distribution pattern over the newspaper issues. However, from the analyzed sample
we may infer that the newspaper considered the matter to have implications in many
different areas, not only as a sportive event. The significance the matter has to the
newspaper can also be said to be unquestionable, since we had to choose only 13
articles from a much broader set of articles related to the theme, which also deserved
a whole special section entirely dedicated to it.
From these 13 articles, 54% (7) were placed in the noblest space of the page, that
is, top left, pointing to their significance in the context of the issues in which they
were published.
In average, they occupied approximately a third of the page, which is a
considerable length for a newspaper article and constitutes another indicator of the
significance of the matter to that particular publication.

QUALITATIVE RESULTS

The analysis of the texts from Folha de S.Paulo also provided us with some
images that were repeated in a significant amount of occasions, revealing the regime
of representation of the Brazilian identity in an internal context, being constructed
through inter-textual relations.
It is noteworthy that the aspect that appeared with most frequency (in 19
occasions), were mentions to the chronic low self-steam of Brazilians that, according
to the representations examined, tend to feel diminished in comparison with other
peoples. Also significant is the fact that this characteristic was referred to most of the
times associated with the idea that being chosen to host an Olympic Game had the
effect to start to elevate the self-steam of Brazilians. This is demonstrated by phrases
such as president Lula statement that Because we are a colonized country, we have
the habit of thinking small.

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This low self-steam is referred to several times in the popular expression mongrel
complex and by mentioning a general sense of distrust that accompanied the
celebrations, with people fearing that Brazil might not live up to expectations.
The second aspect in relevance is Brazil recent ascension, configuring it as a
developing country that has gained international relevance recently due to its
economic success, with 15 mentions. These mentions occur through affirmations that
Brazil lives a kind of magic moment, has become a first class country and is a
grown-up.
Violence also appears as a significant aspect, with 13 mentions. However, this has
to be relativized, since most of these occurrences (11) appear in only one article, in
which a piece published in an American magazine about Rios criminality is
described. Nevertheless, those mentions are made using very strong images, such as
that Rio is at the mercy of gangs, a city ruled by gangs, where the public forces
have an derisive participation, incapable of guarantying the safety of the population,
making violent an aspect which causes a strong impression.
The affectionate and emotional aspect of the Brazilian identity has also appeared
in 13 occasions, associated mainly to the reactions of the Brazilian president Lula,
who is portrayed several times as crying and stating that he was very moved and that
the decision caused him a lot of emotions.
The last aspect related to Brazilians characteristic that appeared in a relevant
number of occasions (12) was Brazilians festive character. This aspect appears
especially in situations that portray the celebrations in Copacabana in pictures that
show people dancing and partying in an anticipated Carnival and the reactions of
the Brazilian delegation in Copenhagen which are reported to have climbed into
chairs and screamed in an explosion of joy.
In smaller but still significant number of appearances there were representations of
social inequality, informality, tropicality, joy and lack of organisation.

General results

75

First of all, it is interesting to compare the aspects that emerged in each instance of
our analysis, that of a foreign newspaper and that of a national newspaper.
In The New York Times texts, the aspects that stand out in the representation of
Brazil and Brazilians, as we have already argued, are, in order of frequency of
appearance: festive people, marginal country, affectionate and emotional people,
violent country, country with lack of organization, developing country, informal
people, sensual people, tropical country, socially unequal country.
On the other hand, in Folha de S.Paulo texts, the aspects that stand out are, also in
order of frequency of appearance: people with low self-steam, developing country,
violent country, affectionate and emotional people, festive people, informal people,
socially unequal country, tropical country, joyful people, country with lack of
organization.
It is noteworthy that the lists do not present an essential difference in the aspects
enumerated, with the main divergences appearing in the different relative relevance of
the aspects in each list. For example, the festive character of Brazilian people, which
is at the top of the list of occurrences in the articles from The New York Times, is only
fifth in the list based on the content from Folha de S.Paulo.
In this sense, it is probably fruitful to group the aspects that appear in both sources
of data and separate them from the aspects that are only present in one of them.
Festive people, affectionate and emotional people, violent country, country with lack
of organisation, developing country, informal people, tropical country and socially
unequal country are the aspects of representation of Brazil that are shared by both
foreigners and nationals. Hence, we can say that those are the most common and
widespread images of Brazil and Brazilian people.
From the set of aspects extracted from the texts published in The New York Times,
the aspects that only appear in their context are the representation of Brazil as a
marginal country and the representation of Brazilians as a sensual people. On the
other hand, the aspects that were only relevant in Folha de S.Paulo texts were the low
self-steam of Brazilians and joy.
Hence, we may say that sensuality was not an aspect that the Brazilian press is
inclined to emphasize, preferring to put emphasis in the joy of the Brazilian people,
while a foreign newspaper does not have any reservations to diffusing an image of
Brazilian sensuality, which is also a very common stereotype about the country. We
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can also affirm that, while The New York Times articles emphasize the previous
condition of Brazil as a second-class country, Folha de S.Paulo emphasizes the
positive side of its recent ascension to a better position. Those are the main
differences in representation between the two newspapers.
Having outlined the mains aspects of the representation of Brazil and Brazilian
identity in the context of foreign and national media and having concluding that they
are surprisingly similar in both contexts, we can now examine them in the light of the
ideas about Brazilian culture and identity presented in the Theories chapter.
To recall what were the main traits of Brazilian identity pointed by the work of the
four Brazilian authors we examined, we have to go back to the keywords we
identified in the end of the Theories chapter. They were: racial mix, African traits,
and social intimacy (in the case of Gilberto Freyre); personalism, lack of inclination
to work, amicability and individualism (in the case of Srgio Buarque de Holanda);
opposition between impersonal laws and personal relations, hierarchy, aversion to
conflicts and rituals of subversion of the system (in the case of Roberto da Matta);
novelty, hybridism, syncretism, homogeneity, multiculturalism, mestizage, joy,
happiness, national-ethnicity and class stratification (in the case of Darcy Ribeiro).
Social intimacy, personalism, amicability, personal relations (as opposed to
impersonal laws) are concepts that bear significant similarity in the context of
Brazilian identity and may be said to refer to the same kind of behaviour. In this way,
the informal and emotional/affectionate representational aspects identified during our
analysis may be said to refer to the same kind of trait of Brazilian identity that the
previously mentioned concepts refer to. Thus, the idea of Brazilians as a people which
mix personal relations and reactions in all instances of its life, even institutional ones,
may be said to reflected and reproduced by the representational practices of the
newspapers we analyzed.
The rituals of subversion of the hierarchy system, pointed by Da Matta as the only
way in which to escape the burden of the hierarchical characteristic of Brazilian
society, may be associated to what the two newspapers showed as an inclination to
festivities, especially public ones in which anyone could take party, as the
celebrations of the election of Rio in Copacabana.

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Hierarchy and class stratification are also identifiable among the aspects we
outlined from the representation of Brazil by the two newspapers in the form of social
inequality.
The lack of organisation may be linked to the lack of inclination to work and
individualism that De Holanda points as an Iberian heritage, which, along with
slavery, prevented the Brazilian free men from organising themselves.
There is one last noteworthy aspect in the contrast between the aspects we
extracted from the analysis and the theoretical accounts of Brazilian identity, and it
has to do with a very significant absence. In the totality of articles analysed, none
pointed to ethnic and racial tensions in the Brazilian identity and, most significantly,
none of them treated the country and the people as non-homogenous, despite the
diversity aspect that appeared in a few articles. From this absence we can conclude
that the idea of Brazil as a homogenous country is also reflected and reproduced by
the media as it does not point to any focus of divergences apart from the social
stratification of the Brazilian society. In this sense, we may say that the silence of the
press works in favour of the consolidation of a multicultural coalition, in which
difference is not emphasized.
The tropical aspect, although not related to the theoretical accounts we studied, is
the background against which all of them were developed, since the natural
characteristics of the territory were a part of the factors that acted over the Brazilian
people over the time.
The other representational aspects of Brazil that cannot be linked to the theoretical
accounts we examined violent country, developing country may be said to be
related to political, economic and international affairs circumstances which do not
have much to do with the historical formation of a Brazilian identity. However, they
are still very relevant since they are a significant part of the representation of Brazil
and Brazilians that emerge from a major international newspaper and a major national
newspaper.
Considering the argumentation presented here, we may say that, although the main
aspects of the representation of Brazil and Brazilians that emerged from the analysis
of a foreign and a national news outlet are not completely in tune with the theoretical
account about Brazilian identity we examined in the Theories chapter, there is a
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significant set of relations between the two. Hence, we may say that the media is, in
some aspects, affected by the reality of things that are the material source for
theories, reflecting them and helping to reproduce them, thus affecting the social
practices of particular communities and participating in the process of imagining a
community. At the same time, the media also creates its own set of representations
that are more circumstantial than historical, as is the news media itself, when
compared to social sciences.
At this point, we may say that we accomplished the task of answering the three
research questions posed in the initial considerations that guided this work.

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CONCLUSION

The main objective of this work has been to analyze how the Brazilian identity is
represented in foreign and national news in order to uncover the patterns of
representation, compare the representational practices that emerge from the different
sources and read it in the light of theories about identity, representation and Brazilian
culture.
We departed from an eagerness to obtain a deeper knowledge of Brazilian identity,
together with the assumption, supported especially by reference to the work of
Schudson, that news shape reality and are shaped by it at the same time.
In order to inform our analysis, we examined the processes through which
identities are constructed and imagined communities emerge, which, as we saw in the
Theories chapter, are intrinsically related to the process of representation. In this
theoretical account, we saw that identities are constructed and always in process, that
newspaper consumption (as ritual and source of information) is essential to imagining
a community and that representational practices occur across different texts and
involve the process of stereotyping.
We also outlined the main theoretical lines of understanding of the Brazilian
identity and the processes through which it emerged, according to the tradition of
Brazilian social sciences represented by four authors Gilberto Freyre, Srgio
Buarque de Holanda, Roberto da Matta and Darcy Ribeiro from which we extracted
a set of characteristics of the Brazilian people which includes multiculturality,
personalism in all instances of relations, class stratification and homogeneity.
Having all these theoretical accounts as standpoints for the analysis, articles from
two major newspapers a foreign one, The New York Times, and a national one,
Folha de S.Paulo were selected according to their relation to the main theme of this
research Brazilian identity. These articles were analysed quantitatively and
qualitatively using tools from content analysis and textual analysis in order to identify
patterns in the representation of Brazil and Brazilian identity which could be later
compared and contrasted to the theoretical accounts presented in the Theories
chapter.
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From the results of the analysis we could conclude firstly that the representations
of Brazilian identity in the foreign and in the national newspaper are surprisingly
similar in many aspects, with only differences in the relative frequency of particular
aspects in one and in the other setting. The representational aspects that emerged as
most relevant from the analysis were festive, affectionate, emotional, and informal
characters, a tropical, violent country, with lack of organisation, developing, and
socially unequal.
The contrast of those aspects with the traits of Brazilian identity accounted for in
the theoretical works of Brazilian scholars revealed some significant similarities,
leading us to conclude that, although the media operates in its own way and some of
the aspects that emerged were more related to the media circumstantial character than
to theory, it is clear that both media and theoretical discourses are based in the same
source, that it is, a society which social practices the media reflect and help to
reproduce.

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ORIGINAL TEXTS

Text 1

The New York Times - October 2, 2009 Friday

The Smart Choice for Olympic Host
By CONSTANTINE COURCOULAS and GEORGE HAY
Will it be Chicago, Madrid, Rio de Janeiro or Tokyo? The grandees of the
International Olympic Committee will announce the location of the 2016 Summer
Olympics on Friday evening in Copenhagen. But in this contest, most of the bidders
stand to lose more than they stand to gain.
The benefits of hosting the event include jobs, investment, a rise in tourism and a
facelift for city and country. Even so, Olympic investments rarely pay off.
Look at Athens. Greece spent around 9 billion euros ($13 billion) ''bringing the
games back home'' in 2004. That's about 4 percent of gross domestic product, money
that might have been put to better use later. Politicians are now bickering about
whether the country can afford an economic stimulus package of similar size.
True, the new transportation system in Athens is more than welcome, as the
regeneration of east London for the 2012 Olympics will be. But the Greek capital now
has more stadiums than it can use. In fact, the Olympics have often lost money and
left host cities with the wrong sorts of infrastructure.
That said, most of the 2016 contestants are making an effort to keep the cost of
the Olympics reasonable, though history suggests that parsimony in bidding is usually
a distant memory when the closing ceremony comes around.
Chicago's bid, which has lured the president and first lady to Copenhagen,
promises to finance the games entirely in the private sector. Madrid claims that close
to 80 percent of its buildings are either built or under construction, limiting its further

82

outlays. And Tokyo says its investment in environmentally friendly structures will
reap future dividends.
Meanwhile, Rio de Janeiro's $14.4 billion bid towers above the rest in terms of
cost. Oddly enough, though, it probably also makes the most economic sense, even
though the required public investment in transportation and security will add
significantly to the expense.
Brazil has a developing commodity-driven economy that has done relatively well
despite the global slowdown. Its debt has recently been accorded investment grade
status. And it's a populous place: the Olympics would only cost 1 percent of G.D.P.
Rio itself is a fast-growing city whose infrastructure could do with an Olympic
upgrade. It needs the event more than the others. And Brazil would be better able to
absorb the cost, too.
Britain in the Lead
The Labour government in Britain secured itself a quick win this week. By being
the first of the Group of 20 nations to pressure its banks into signing up to a new
accord on bonuses, Britain has ensured it will not look soft on banking excesses. For
the embattled prime minister, Gordon Brown, that makes political sense.
Mr. Brown's move is all the more notable for securing the consent of Barclays,
which refused money or asset insurance from the British government in the recent
downturn. Of the five banks that have signed on -- the Lloyds Banking Group, the
Royal Bank of Scotland, Standard Chartered and HSBC -- Barclays has the biggest
roster of investment bankers, and they will want to receive large bonuses as soon as
possible.
Barclays could lose some of these coveted human resources to banks that work
under softer bonus regimes. But signing on now could keep the government off its
back, and in reality does not change that much. The G-20 proposals, including
deferring some bonuses over three years, with clawbacks for poor performance, are
already enshrined in the British financial regulator's own new rules on pay. And they
will apply to overseas banks with subsidiaries in Britain, too.

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While the British have moved first, other G-20 nations will soon be following.
But that won't necessarily make the global playing field completely flat. The wording
of the accord reached last week in Pittsburgh is vague enough to allow interpretation.
Some regulators, possibly in the United States, might set slightly more flexible
standards.
But that might not happen. After all, Mr. Brown is not the only world leader who
would like to avoid a race away from bonus vigilance. But if a contest does start,
Barclays and other British banks will be quick to argue that national politics should
not determine pay in a competitive global market, and Mr. Brown might have to
backtrack fast.
For more independent financial commentary and analysis, visit
www.breakingviews.com.

Text 2

The New York Times - October 3, 2009 Saturday

Rio de Janeiro Picked to Hold 2016 Olympics
By JULIET MACUR; Monica Davey contributed reporting from Chicago; Alexei
Barrionuevo from Rio de Janeiro; and Richard Sandomir, Katie Thomas and Lynn
Zinser from New York.
When Rio de Janeiro was elected host city for the 2016 Olympic Games on Friday,
the room where its bid team gathered turned into a boisterous party with members in
uniform navy or moss green blazers hugging, dancing, crying and waving Brazilian
flags. The bid leader, Carlos Arthur Nuzman, yelled, ''We did it! We did it!''
Rio and Chicago had gone into the day considered the favorites, ahead of Tokyo
and Madrid. But by the time Rio was chosen by the International Olympic Committee
to become the first South American city to host the Olympics, the Chicago delegation
and its star-studded supporters were nowhere in sight.

84

They had already left the building.

Despite the support of President Obama, who flew in specifically to address the
I.O.C. voters, Chicago finished last, out of the running in the first round of voting,
with a paltry 18 of a total 94 votes. Tokyo received 22, with Rio getting 26 and
Madrid 28. In each round, until one city gains a majority, the low vote-getter is
eliminated. After Chicago was tossed aside, nearly all of its votes went straight to Rio
in the second round. In the third, after Tokyo was eliminated, Rio won handily, 66-32.
The chance to bring the Olympics to a continent that had never hosted the Games
worked in Rio's favor. During its presentation, the bid team showed a graphic of the
world and marked all the places that have held an Olympics. South America was
glaringly bare.
''There was absolutely no flaw in the bid,'' the I.O.C. president, Jacques Rogge,
said.
Chicago officials had worked nearly four years and spent nearly $50 million to
bring the Summer Olympics to the United States for the first time since the
(Continues on page D6)
1996 Atlanta Games. There were many possible explanations for Chicago's
spectacular failure, but little consensus.
Some pointed to the regional bloc voting in the treacherous first round. Others
said some voters, assuming Chicago was a lock to advance because of the presence of
Mr. Obama and his wife, Michelle, might have taken their early votes elsewhere.
Many also blamed the rocky relationship between the United States Olympic
Committee and the I.O.C.
Others said there was no explaining it.
''Everybody was shocked at that result,'' said Rene Fasel, an I.O.C. member from
Switzerland, regarding Chicago's first-round ouster. ''Everybody expected Chicago
and Rio, everybody. It was really strange, and I feel really sorry. If it would have been
Chicago and Rio in the end, it would have been much closer.''

85

Anita DeFrantz, one of two I.O.C. members from the United States, said she
could not believe how the vote unfolded, particularly after the Obamas' visit. ''I hate
the fact that these elegant people were here and then our country got treated that way,''
she said.
Beyond showing an apparent indifference to the United States' star power, the
I.O.C. vote was interpreted as a repudiation of the U.S.O.C., which has been in
upheaval over the past year and has struggled to gain a favorable standing within the
I.O.C.
''It was a defeat for the U.S.O.C., not for Chicago,'' said Denis Oswald, an I.O.C.
member from Switzerland.
Mr. Oswald said that 10 to 15 fellow I.O.C. members had approached him
recently wanting to discuss issues related to the U.S.O.C. He said that changes in
U.S.O.C. leadership ''has not helped,'' either, and that it was clear that the Chicago bid
and the U.S.O.C. were not united. Stephanie Streeter, the acting chief executive of the
U.S.O.C., and Larry Probst, the committee's chairman, have taken their posts in the
last year and have run into problems with the I.O.C., most notably over their stalled
plan for an Olympic television network and their share of the Games' network and
corporate sponsorship contracts.
''The United States, within the Olympic movement, hasn't engaged as well as we
could have for a long time,'' said Robert Ctvrtlik, the U.S.O.C. vice president for
international relations. ''There's a lot of politics going on. This isn't just on the merits.
I don't think it's anti-American. Maybe we still don't have the horsepower to do some
of the politicking within the movement.''
For the first time, a United States president met with the I.O.C. on behalf of an
American bid -- which U.S.O.C. officials called the country's strongest bid ever -- but
that was not enough. This followed New York City's failed bid for the 2012 Summer
Games, a second-round exit after winning only 19 votes.
''All we know is that the first round is always the most dangerous and obviously
we didn't have a large region of support,'' Chicago's bid leader, Patrick G. Ryan, said.
''We wanted to bring home the victory and we didn't. It wasn't our day.''

86

On his flight back to Washington on Friday, Mr. Obama said he was disappointed
about Chicago's finish.
''I have no doubt that it was the strongest bid possible and I'm proud that I was
able to come in and help make that case in person,'' Mr. Obama said after arriving
back in Washington.
In Rio, officials declared a holiday for city and state employees. While tens of
thousands of people had begun the celebration on the city's Copacabana beach, where
people dressed in shorts and bikinis jumped to samba music, the scene was different
earlier in Chicago.
All over the city, people responded to the city's elimination with astonished
silence, blank looks and questions. The word there had been that Chicago would
survive at least until a late round of voting, if not win. Planned celebrations at
schools, parks and restaurants ended abruptly Friday morning.
''It's sad,'' said Marshall Burt, a lawyer, as he stood in Daley Plaza, in the heart of
Chicago's Loop, where thousands had gathered for what they expected to be a victory
rally. ''But I think probably the world is still not real keen on America.'' He added
later, ''Chicago may still have the image of gangsters and corruption.''
The I.O.C. member Kevan Gosper, of Australia, said the few votes cast for
Chicago could have been an accident. ''There might have been an effort on the part of
the Asian group to protect Tokyo in the first round,'' he said.
Richard W. Pound, an I.O.C. member from Canada, said that Chicago might have
been eliminated early on purpose. ''I think there were a lot of people saying, if we
don't get it, we'll support you, but we've got to stop Chicago,'' he said. ''That's sport
politics, not anything else. It's election management. The Europeans and the Asians
are much better at this than we are.''
Some members of the Olympic movement in the United States said they were
bracing for this moment.
Skip Gilbert, the chief executive of USA Triathlon and the chairman of the
National Governing Bodies Association, said he planned to meet with other

87

executives at national governing bodies to decide what to do next. One option would
be to recommend a change in leadership, he said.
''I think it comes down to when you have a leadership that has no real connection
to the Olympic movement before they walk into their roles, what would you expect
that they're going to be able to do in terms of being leaders of an Olympic
movement?'' he said. ''Unfortunately it seems like -- and the vote kind of confirms it -that we were doomed to fail from the beginning.''
Still, Chicago planned for victory. The bid team reserved a hall in downtown
here, where they had planned to celebrate with about 500 supporters. When the team
arrived, the crowd began singing ''The Star-Spangled Banner,'' said Michael Plant, a
U.S.O.C. board member here as part of Chicago's delegation.
Geography, though, was Rio's strongest point. It helped the city overcome
concerns about security in the Brazilian city. There were also concerns that the
country would be overextended because it is hosting the 2014 World Cup.
It helped Rio that the I.O.C. has a history of trying to effect change with its
choices for bid cities. The committee awarded the 2008 Summer Games to Beijing,
hoping to help open China to the world. In 1981, it gave the 1988 Summer Games to
Seoul to help usher in a civilian government.
By choosing Rio, it could help the country develop faster and could bring an
entire continent of people closer to the Olympic movement.
''Today is the most emotional day in my life, the most exciting day of my life,''
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil said. ''I've never felt more pride in
Brazil. Now, we are going to show the world we can be a great country. We aren't the
United States, but we are getting there, and we will get there.''

Text 3

The New York Times - October 3, 2009 Saturday

88

A VOTE FOR BRAZIL

Rio de Janeiro was awarded the 2016 Olympics, marking the first time the Games
will be held in South America. Despite a personal plea on its behalf from President
Obama, Chicago finished last in the voting.

Text 4

The New York Times - October 3, 2009 Saturday

A Great Choice, Even if Others Were Worthy
By GEORGE VECSEY.
E-mail: [email protected]
Parabens para o Rio.
Congratulations to a new city, a new country and, in fact, to a new continent for
the Olympic Games. The five Olympic rings make more sense now.
In recent years, the International Olympic Committee has expressed the need to
represent all its constituencies, to move its quadrennial festivals around the world.
The I.O.C. has put its money where its press releases have been. On Friday it
voted to put the 2016 Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro, thereby putting the Olympics
in South America for the first time in what will be the 120th year of the modern
Olympic movement.
In the cosmic scheme of things, it was the absolute right thing to do, even though
three other great world cities made compelling bids -- Chicago, eliminated first,
Tokyo eliminated second, and Madrid. Any of them would have been terrific, but Rio
made the most sense in the spirit of the Games, often expressed, not always observed
by the Eurocentric burghers who dominate the I.O.C.
Geopolitical bloc voting could have produced the spread that saw Chicago with
the low total of 18 votes after the first round, according to Harvey Schiller, a former
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executive director of the United States Olympic Committee, who was an observer in
Copenhagen. Now the president of the International Baseball Federation, Schiller said
Chicago suffered because of recent gaffes by the U.S.O.C., but he also said the desire
(Continues in page D7)
to spread the Games around was a factor.
Next year's World Cup, the biggest sports tournament in the world, will be held in
South Africa because of the inclusive policy of the world soccer body, FIFA. In 2014
the World Cup will be held in Brazil. Welcome to the world.
With the push of an electronic button in Copenhagen, nearly 100 I.O.C. members
supported the expression by Brazil's president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, that it was
the right time to correct the imbalance among world sporting hosts. Last week in New
York, da Silva made the case that Brazil's growing economy, fueled by oil and aircraft
factories, had made it more than the nation of the samba and the beaches and the
emotional soul of soccer.
''I honestly believe it is Brazil's time,'' da Silva said Friday, and a few hours later,
it was.
Brazil's leaders have tried to combat the image of the gangs in the hillside favelas,
or slums, with da Silva noting that Brazil, at least, is not the target of world terrorism.
In the fierce competition for this world showcase, just about anything is fair game.
The biggest loss on Friday was suffered by Chicago, which had put up an
impressive plan for a compact area close to Lake Michigan and its familiar skyline
and its handsome downtown.
The Chicago City Council even voted, by 49-0, early in September, to create an
insurance plan that would guarantee any losses from the 2016 Games. Losses can
happen, as shown by the large deficits and empty arenas for previous hosts like
Montreal, Sydney and Athens. In recent polls, Chicagoans seemed virtually divided,
with many residents concerned that the Games could take away resources from
schools and hospitals and the transportation system. The Olympics are hardly the
economic boon its boosters like to claim.

90

When Chicago was eliminated in the first round, thousands of residents let out a
mass sigh and shuffled back to work, just as happened in Paris in 2005 when that city
lost to London.
Britain's prime minister at the time, Tony Blair, had flown all the way to
Singapore to bring home the 2012 bacon. In 2007, the then-president of Russia,
Vladimir V. Putin, made the run to Guatemala City to bring home the 2014 blinis for
the Sochi region.
This time, President Barack Obama felt impelled to make a flying visit to
Copenhagen, joining his wife, Michelle, as well as Oprah Winfrey. It is a sign of the
times that the president's willingness to stick up for a great American city was
depicted as sordid local politics by radio and television yappers.
The president talked about Chicago and himself as examples of American
diversity, he chatted up I.O.C. members, and maybe he never changed a single mind
because of factors having nothing to do with him.
Some members of the I.O.C. are still smarting over the scandal at the turn of the
century when officials in Salt Lake City were discovered buying off I.O.C. members.
Some members still miss the shopping trips for their wives and jobs for their sons,
and have not forgotten the anger of Senator John McCain at one Senate hearing in
April 1999 and of representatives at a Congressional hearing in December 1999.
Those long memories did not help New York's clumsy candidacy for the 2012
Games, and may have hurt the vastly superior plan by Chicago this time around. The
U.S.O.C., which has become as remote as North Korea, may have doomed Chicago's
bid by trying to create an Olympic television network.
The three defeated cities will go on.
Chicago still has its symphony orchestra and the Art Institute and the Bears.
Tokyo had a competent green plan for 2016, but it may have suffered for having
already hosted the Games. It continues to be a fascinating city, with the Tsukiji fish
market, plus the city, lit up at night like a pinball machine.

91

Madrid had a compact and thoughtful plan but probably was hurt by Barcelona's
having hosted the Games in 1992. It still has Goya in the Prado and Real Madrid in
the Bernabeu stadium.
Rio may have given the impression that it needed the Games more than the other
three cities. It can surely match its competitors for image -- ''city of love and
mysteries,'' in the Antonio Carlos Jobim song, ''Song of the Jet,'' which will make
anybody an instant Brazilian. The I.O.C., in its burgeoning inclusiveness, is doing the
same. Parabens ao Brasil. Congratulations to Brazil.

Text 5

The New York Times - October 4, 2009 Sunday

RIO TOASTS OLYMPIC WIN
There was the feeling that something powerful had just happened to the country.
Thousands of Brazilians poured onto Copacabana Beach to celebrate Rio's selection
as the site of the 2016 Olympics. PAG. 10

Text 6

The New York Times - October 4, 2009 Sunday

Dancing Into the Evening, Brazil Celebrates Its Arrival on the World Stage
By ALEXEI BARRIONUEVO; Mery Galanternick contributed reporting.
Carnaval came four months early to Brazil this year.
Tens of thousands of Rio's samba-loving residents poured out onto Copacabana
Beach where they danced into the evening in flip-flops and green-and-yellow bikinis
to celebrate their city's selection as the site of the 2016 Olympics.
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There was pride and the feeling that something powerful had just happened to the
country. The International Olympic Committee's decision to entrust the games to
Brazil -- the first in South America -- confirmed this country's arrival onto the world
stage with a defining moment that to many here promised even greater prosperity in
the decade to come.
''My Brazil is solid,'' said Celso de Nascimento, an electrical technician, who
danced shirtless with his wife in the hot afternoon sun. ''We have it all.''
Noting that Rio beat out Chicago for the honor, he said, ''We aren't the United
States, but we are getting there, and we will get there.''
The decision was also a seminal achievement for President Luiz Inacio Lula da
Silva, a former auto plant worker with a fourth-grade education who has helped make
Brazil the economic and political leader of South America.
''Brazil went from a second-class country to a first-class country, and today we
began to receive the respect we deserve,'' Mr. da Silva said from Copenhagen after the
vote on Friday, pulling out a handkerchief several times during the ceremony to dab
cheeks wet with tears. ''I could die now and it already would have been worth it.''
The Olympic glow seemed to reinforce the perception that Mr. da Silva was born
under the luckiest of stars. Brazil rode a commodity and consumer-spending boom the
past half-decade as the government tamed inflation, expanded the economy and
narrowed a wide inequality gap. In just the past two years Brazil has discovered huge
troves of deep-sea oil.
With the soccer World Cup coming to Brazil in 2014 -- the final match is to be
played at Rio's Maracana Stadium -- the country is set to be a showcase for two of the
world's greatest sporting events.
When he was elected in 2002, Mr. da Silva's background as a union leader and a
leftist unnerved international financial markets and the Bush administration. But he
adopted a pragmatic approach that calmed foreign investors and solidified Brazil's
economy. His charisma and popularity, both in and out of his country, helped him
eclipse Venezuela's Hugo Chavez as the region's most influential leader.

93

While Mr. Chavez has been largely shunned by the United States, Mr. da Silva
has rubbed shoulders with an admiring President Obama, negotiated military deals
with President Nicolas Sarkozy of France and become an important player in global
climate discussions. Two weeks ago he was feted in New York at a dinner attended
by American Congress members and the chief executive of Exxon.
''The Olympics are a crowning achievement in the efforts that Brazil has made to
participate actively in world affairs,'' said Amaury de Souza, a political analyst in Rio.
For Mr. da Silva, the Olympics have been part of an ''obsession'' with being
remembered as a great president, Mr. de Souza said, of Mr. da Silva's overcoming his
humble beginnings.
Mr. da Silva, a sports fan, threw himself into the Olympic bid process, traveling
to London and Beijing to visit Olympic facilities and meet with committee delegates,
and ensuring that Rio's bid had financial guarantees at the federal level. Since 2003,
he has increased spending on sports programs in the country to $773 million from
$209 million, the Sports Ministry said.
In Denmark on Friday Mr. da Silva's speech in support of the bid seemed to win
votes abroad and at home.
''I had hoped that we could win, but after the speech by Lula I had no doubt
whatsoever,'' said Daniel Martins, 46, a lawyer who ambled by on his bicycle to take
in the party in Copacabana. ''We are so moved, so proud to be Brazilians today, to be
Cariocas,'' he said, using the name for Rio residents.
Still, amid the celebration, the realization began to dawn that the hard work was
just beginning. Rio's $11 billion budget for urban infrastructure projects for the
Olympics was three times larger than the bid of any other finalist, and its history of
overpromising projects for the 2007 Pan-American Games left a bad taste in the
mouths of many here.
Organizers will have to build more hotel rooms and complete a ring road to
relieve congestion to the airport. A high-speed train from Rio to Sao Paulo is expected
to be completed in time for the World Cup.

94

Some argued that Brazil was not ready to host the Games, and that the money
could be better spent relieving poverty and further developing sports programs in a
country where most professional athletes earn very little.
''Having an Olympics here now is an insult to Brazil's underprivileged, including
to the athletes,'' said Alberto Murray Neto, a lawyer in Sao Paulo and former Brazilian
Olympic committee member who opposed Rio's bid.
There is also a palpable dread that many Brazilians express privately that Rio will
embarrass the country, that it will not be able to improve the choking traffic and that
the city's urban blight and rampant drug-fueled violence will be laid bare for all the
world to see.
''They are going to make the city pretty'' for the event, said Helen Andrade, who
works the front counter at a luncheonette here. ''But just like they did with the PanAm games, they will throw a lot of spiffy-looking policemen at the situation and
when it's over, one day later there won't be anything.''
Still, ''the Olympics gives us the perfect pretext to push ahead, in reforming the
cities, in making more and more decisive efforts in reducing poverty,'' said Mr. de
Souza, the political analyst. ''This is an ongoing battle. But what we won today will be
an essential driver in our efforts to improve the country.''
On Copacabana Beach, the Cariocas bouncing a giant green beach ball
emblazoned with the words ''this is Rio's time'' harbored no doubts or reservations.
Couples kissed passionately between sips of beer. The drum corps Salgueiro, the
samba school champion of the 2009 Carnaval, whipped the crowd into a frenzy.
''This is the moment for Rio, for South America,'' said Paulo Cesar, 30, as three
tipsy friends chanted ''Bra-zil!'' behind him.
''The moment is now.''

Text 7

95

The New York Times - October 4, 2009 Sunday

Last of the Great Cities
A DANGEROUS BEAUTY
Larry Rohter, a reporter for The New York Times, was based for a time in Rio de
Janeiro, which last week beat out Chicago, Madrid and Tokyo to host the 2016
Summer Olympic Games. In advance of the 2007 Pan American Games in Rio, he
offered this advice to visitors in an article in the paper's Travel section:
Nestled between verdant mountains and an azure sea, Rio is without question a
stunning site for the games, and more than $1.5 billion has gone into the preparations,
including the new 45,000-seat Joao Havelange Stadium. But as hospitable as the city
can be, it is not without problems for visitors, particularly when it comes to safety.
It is no secret that Rio is crime-ridden and quite violent, and becoming more so:
the heavily-armed gangs that control the hillside squatter slums known as favelas are
growing increasingly bolder in their assaults and threats, even in the city's most elite
neighborhoods.
Brazilian authorities have sought to dampen concerns about security and the
possibility of terrorism during the games with a pledge of intense patrolling of the city
by units that will include both the police and the armed forces. They note that in 1992,
when the United Nations sponsored a global meeting on the environment in Rio, the
event went off without incident despite predictions of a crime wave ...
Nevertheless, wherever you are in Rio, it pays to be careful and to observe certain
basic safety precautions. Do not flaunt jewelry or expensive cameras and video
equipment, especially on the beach. For those who do not speak Portuguese, it is also
advisable to move about in groups rather than alone, preferably with a local guide or
translator.

Text 8

96

Folha de S.Paulo September 29, 2009

Guinada geopoltica deve nortear discurso de Lula
DOS ENVIADOS A COPENHAGUE
Se Barack Obama est confirmado na apresentao final ao COI, o presidente Luiz
Incio Lula da Silva, que chegar amanh a Copenhague, tem sua participao quase
certa.
S no foi oficializada pela Rio-2016 porque a candidatura tenta guardar segredo
sobre todos os aspectos da organizao do evento. Hoje, ocorre um ensaio, fechado
para a imprensa.
Lula foi includo na delegao brasileira de 60 pessoas que estaro no Bella
Center, centro de convenes da capital dinamarquesa, onde as candidaturas tero a
ltima chance de falar aos membros do COI.
Questionado sobre a participao do presidente brasileiro, o comandante do
comit, Carlos Arthur Nuzman, foi evasivo. Mas fez questo de perpetrar um discurso
de confiana em Lula e nos seus conhecimentos esportivos: "Ele natural. No
precisa dizer nada para ele".
A prtica, porm, diferente. Lula vem passando por uma preparao para o
encontro com o COI. Ele recebe informaes sobre a histria da Olimpada, assim
como detalhes da candidatura por meio de uma interao de informaes entre a sua
assessoria e a Rio-2016.
Embora o comit evite falar sobre a apresentao, a tendncia que Lula aborde,
em seu discurso aos membros do COI, a necessidade de levar os Jogos para a
Amrica do Sul e para um pas em desenvolvimento.
O presidente tem frequentemente repetido essas informaes em entrevistas com
jornalistas estrangeiros, para promover a candidatura brasileira.
A defesa de uma guinada geopoltica dos Jogos uma tentativa de neutralizar o
efeito Obama, como ficou evidente na declarao de Nuzman aps a confirmao da
viagem do presidente americano.

97

"A participao de chefes de Estado na campanha pela sede dos Jogos uma
questo de cada candidatura. A estratgia da Rio-2016 para a apresentao final j
est definida, com a liderana do presidente Lula, que est diretamente envolvido com
a candidatura brasileira desde o seu incio, h dois anos", disse Nuzman, por meio de
sua assessoria. (RM E SR)

Text 9

Folha de S.Paulo September 29, 2009

Revista dos EUA mostra Rio merc de gangues
"New Yorker" retrata insegurana e ausncia do Estado na adversria de
Chicago
Publicao ressalta ndices de mortes, explica a estrutura do trfico e expe
ligao entre origem de faces e presos polticos nos anos 70
JANAINA LAGE
DE NOVA YORK
Na semana do anncio da escolha da sede da Olimpada de 2016, a respeitada
revista "New Yorker" apresenta reportagem de 12 pginas sobre a ao dos traficantes
no Rio de Janeiro.
O retrato mostrado pela publicao de uma cidade comandada por gangues, onde
o poder pblico tem participao irrisria, incapaz de garantir a segurana da
populao.
O ttulo da reportagem j indica o que o leitor encontrar nas pginas seguintes:
"Terra de gangues. Quem controla as ruas do Rio de Janeiro?".
O autor, Jon Lee Anderson, jornalista de prestgio, j escreveu uma biografia sobre
Che Guevara e livros sobre guerrilhas e sobre o Afeganisto.

98

O texto contrasta com a campanha do Rio aos Jogos Olmpicos, que explora as
belezas naturais da cidade e o sucesso de polticas de segurana pblica.
A partir da histria de Iara, "subdelegada" de 31 anos e me de trs filhas, que
pertence ao Terceiro Comando Puro e trabalha para Fernandinho, o traficante
Fernando Gomes de Freitas, comandante do Morro do Dend, na Ilha do Governador,
a reportagem traa um painel da atuao do trfico da cidade e da atuao da polcia.
O jornalista da "New Yorker" se encontrou com o traficante. Questionado sobre
onde fica a linha entre certo e errado, diz: "Quem est decidindo?".
Anderson estima que existam hoje mais de mil favelas na capital fluminense. Em
um panorama sombrio, a reportagem afirma que no h meios de escapar
completamente da misria do Rio de Janeiro.
O jornalista relata que os moradores do Morro do Dend vivem sob a autoridade de
um regime de fato, comandado pelo traficante e seu exrcito particular, um padro
que se repete por toda a cidade.
Na tentativa de traduzir para o pblico norte-americano o funcionamento do trfico
carioca, Anderson afirma que pelo menos 100 mil pessoas trabalham para traficantes,
envolvidos em uma estrutura hierrquica similar do mundo corporativo, com
gerentes gerais, subgerentes e donos.
A reportagem descreve tambm as origens de algumas faces criminosas, como o
Terceiro Comando Puro e o Comando Vermelho, este ltimo nascido da mistura de
criminosos comuns e presos polticos na priso em Ilha Grande, no final da dcada de
70.
De acordo com o texto, mais de 20 anos aps a restaurao da democracia, no
existem mais guerrilhas marxistas no pas, apesar de vrios ex-guerrilheiros ocuparem
cargos no governo do presidente Lula.
"O Estado est praticamente ausente das favelas", diz a reportagem, que compara
os ndices de mortes violentas do Rio com os norte-americanos.
Os policiais cariocas matam em mdia pouco mais de trs pessoas por dia, mais do
que o nmero de todo os EUA.
99

Para o chefe da Polcia Civil do Rio, Allan Turnowski, ouvido em julho para a
reportagem, a situao do Rio de Janeiro hoje no de calamidade.
"Se fosse, no haveria volta. E ns podemos. Isto aqui ainda no Bagd ou o
Mxico. Ns temos a capacidade de controlar qualquer parte da cidade que
quisermos", afirmou ele.
"O problema que no podemos ficar para terminar o servio", completou
Turnowski.
TRECHOS
"O Rio de Janeiro a cidade que ocupa o primeiro lugar no ranking de mortes
violentas intencionais"
"Segundo qualquer base de clculo, a segurana pblica no Rio de Janeiro um
desastre"
TRECHOS DA REPORTAGEM DA "NEW YORKER"

Text 10

Folha de S.Paulo September 30, 2009

Candidata usa de piada a batuque
DOS ENVIADOS A COPENHAGUE
Ao se apresentarem imprensa internacional, representantes da candidatura Rio2016 usaram cenas, piadas e frases de efeito para tentar impressionar os jornalistas.
O governador do Rio, Srgio Cabral, disse que "o Rio o Obama desta eleio".
Enquanto isso, o prefeito Eduardo Paes batucava a mesa ao som de "Cidade
Maravilhosa", tocada em vdeo promocional.
"Fora as instalaes, o resto do cenrio real", brincou o apresentador da
candidatura, Mike Lee, sobre a pea que mostrava imagens da cidade.
100

Na equipe de Chicago, a aposta foi na presena de atletas. Eram cerca de 20 atrs

do prefeito Richard Daley e do presidente do comit, Patrick Ryan, em apresentao
feita em cima de uma piscina.
Os esportistas, alguns aposentados, trataram de fazer uma roda em volta dos dois
representantes quando esses foram pressionados por reprteres.
"Quem quer fazer perguntas para os atletas?", afirmou o apresentador. Mas,
quando questionados sobre a cidade que iro preferir, caso Chicago perca no primeiro
turno, todos riram sem graa e fugiram da resposta.
Pouco depois, o ex-jogador de basquete David Robinson fez verdadeiro discurso
para dizer o que a vitria de Chicago representaria de benefcio cidade. "Temos que
formar os futuros desportistas", disse.
Ambas as candidaturas esto espalhando eventos pela capital dinamarquesa. Como
Pel, ontem, os atletas americanos foram visitar crianas. (RM E SR)

Text 11

Folha de S.Paulo October 1, 2009

Editoriais
[email protected]
Apoio ao Rio
Olimpada na capital fluminense chance para cidade se aprimorar, mas
preciso fazer uso idneo do dinheiro pblico
CAPITAL da Colnia, do Imprio e da Repblica durante quase dois sculos, a
cidade do Rio de Janeiro, por sua relevncia histrica, poltica e cultural, por seus
encantos naturais e pelo esprito crtico e otimista de seus habitantes, consagrou-se
como uma espcie de smbolo do Brasil. E esse j seria um bom motivo para
consider-la a anfitri ideal de uma Olimpada a ser realizada em solo brasileiro.
101

Se amanh, dia da escolha, o Comit Olmpico Internacional apontar o dedo para o

Po de Acar, os brasileiros ganharo uma oportunidade de demonstrar para si
mesmos e para o mundo que o pas est altura de seus novos desafios.
recorrente o argumento de que, diante das persistentes carncias sociais da
sociedade brasileira, no seria oportuno organizar competies esportivas das
dimenses de uma Copa do Mundo e de uma Olimpada. Mas essas so situaes
perfeitamente compatveis com uma nao do porte do Brasil, que ganha projeo
internacional e desfruta hoje de estabilidade poltico-econmica.
Deixar de patrocinar espetculos dessa natureza no trar, em contrapartida,
investimentos e polticas pblicas mais eficientes para enfrentar problemas sociais.
Pelo contrrio, a Copa de 2014 e a perspectiva de uma Olimpada em 2016 podem
servir de impulso para um esforo de desenvolvimento em reas nas quais o Brasil
precisa melhorar, como a estrutura de aeroportos e a segurana.
Tm toda a razo aqueles que identificam na preparao desses eventos o risco de
uso irresponsvel de dinheiro pblico. Como em outras reas, tambm no esporte a
corrupo uma praga -e em se tratando de investimentos de vulto, toda vigilncia
ser necessria.
A experincia dos Jogos Pan-Americanos de 2007 no deixou dvida sobre a
importncia de submeter o cronograma de obras a um regime de transparncia e
prestao de contas. Seria inaceitvel que se repetissem erros de planejamento e
descontrole oramentrio.
A histria dos Jogos Olmpicos modernos j evidenciou as potenciais vantagens de
sua realizao. Entre elas, incluem-se uma maior divulgao do pas no plano
internacional, o aumento do fluxo de visitantes e as melhorias materiais -da
infraestrutura s instalaes esportivas. A recuperao urbana de Barcelona para a
Olimpada de 1992 o exemplo a ser emulado.
Nessa direo, a candidatura carioca acerta ao ver no patrocnio dos Jogos a chance
de recuperar a cidade de um processo de degradao cujas marcas so visveis na
poluio ambiental, no crescimento das favelas e na violncia urbana.

102

 com esse esprito que o Rio merece a simpatia e o apoio dos brasileiros para se
tornar nossa primeira cidade olmpica.

Text 12

Folha de S.Paulo October 1, 2009

CARLOS HEITOR CONY
Rio
RIO DE JANEIRO - Decide-se amanh a sede para as Olimpadas de 2016. O
Rio uma das cidades candidatas e desta vez tem chances de ganhar, apesar da fora
de Chicago, patrocinada pessoalmente por Obama. E na categoria de azares, Tquio
e Madri.
O nosso trunfo principal o charme do Rio que, apesar de suas mazelas e de seus
problemas estruturais, uma grife natural, a comear pelo nome de apenas trs letras.
Roma tem quatro e Paris tem cinco letras, s perdemos para Ur, na velha Caldia,
terra de Abrao -segundo palavras cruzadas de todo o mundo. Poucas possibilidades
para ser sede de uma Olimpada moderna.
Teremos sete anos para prepararmos a cidade dentro das formalidades do Comit
Olmpico Internacional. Nossa capacidade nesse setor comprovada com a Copa do
Mundo de 1950, para a qual construmos o maior estdio do mundo, e eventos
internacionais, como a Rio-92 e, mais recentemente, os Jogos Pan-Americanos.
O problema o forte lobby norte-americano por Chicago, com a capacidade de
Obama no trnsito internacional, embora Lula tambm tenha a sua penetrao. Afinal,
a Amrica do Norte j sediou outras olimpadas, e a Amrica do Sul, at agora,
nenhuma.
A importncia de uma Olimpada transcende os esportes, passa a ser econmica e
poltica. Em 1936, os nazistas organizaram um evento que foi considerado o ponto de
partida para a ascenso de um regime que afinal desgraou a Alemanha e o mundo.
103

Hitler compreendeu a fora de propaganda que uma Olimpada representa para um

pas com projetos, sejam l quais forem.
O Brasil tem o projeto de se tornar potncia mundial. A Olimpada no Rio ser
uma plataforma de lanamento que saberemos aproveitar, colocando em rbita um
novo gigante que tem tudo para uma carreira no cenrio internacional.

Text 13

Folha de S.Paulo October 2, 2009

Lula vende seu prprio sucesso aos eleitores
Em campanha, presidente ressalta o xito recente da economia nacional
Confiante, mandatrio conversa com os votantes e mostra o futuro do pas
com o pr-sal, a Copa de 2014 e mais investimentos
DOS ENVIADOS A COPENHAGUE
O presidente Luiz Incio Lula da Silva usou o mais bem cotado produto brasileiro
no exterior para vender a candidatura do Rio de Janeiro a sede da Olimpada de 2016:
ele mesmo.
Na primeira entrevista coletiva em Copenhague, em um longo dia de lobby com o
Comit Olmpico Internacional (COI), Lula recauchutou perguntas e desfilou dados
sobre seu governo, citou suas campanhas presidenciais e comparou a postulao do
Rio -uma "superao"- com sua histria pessoal. Tudo no superlativo.
"Posso garantir que hoje, no mundo, nenhum pas tem certeza de seu futuro como
o Brasil", afirmou. "Nossa autoestima est mais elevada porque as pessoas tm
clareza de que o Brasil vive uma espcie de momento mgico. (...) esse Brasil que
queremos mostrar aos delegados e delegadas."

104

O presidente passou boa parte do dia recebendo votantes em uma sute no sexto
andar do imenso hotel Marriot e tentando, como ele definiu, "vender a eles o futuro
do Brasil".
Lula conversou pessoalmente com um a um, em portugus, auxiliado pelo
intrprete.
Parou apenas para almoar, em uma recepo da rainha da Dinamarca, Margrethe
2, da qual fizeram parte o casal real espanhol, rei Juan Carlos e rainha Sofa, e a
primeira-dama americana, Michelle Obama, alm de representantes japoneses e da
apresentadora americana de TV Oprah Winfrey.
Depois, voltou ao Marriot para uma nova sesso de encontros, da qual a delegao
saiu otimista, ainda que o discurso variasse do "vamos ganhar" do ministro Orlando
Silva Jnior (Esporte) ao "temos chance" do presidente do Banco Central, Henrique
Meirelles.
J seu tom era de palanque brasileiro, como o prprio Lula admitiu ao declarar que
lanaria mo "um pouco dos argumentos que usamos para ganhar as eleies no
Brasil".
"Todo mundo que acompanha economia sabe que o Brasil hoje est em uma
situao mais favorvel do que muitos pases desenvolvidos", disse Lula ao explicar
sua campanha. Enumerou os investimentos, lembrou a conquista da sede da Copa2014, citou o pr-sal. E comparou o emprego no Brasil ao desemprego nos pases
ricos.
At da performance do BC e das mudanas que seu governo promoveu na poltica
externa -definidas por ele como mudanas na "geografia poltica mundial"- o
presidente falou.
Mas para concluir, foi a uma frase de seu principal "rival" na disputa de
popularidade que tomou Copenhague, Barack Obama, que Lula recorreu para resumir
sua campanha.
"Sim, ns podemos", disse, vertendo para o portugus o slogan do americano
("Yes, we can") na sua eleio. "Fica bonito dito por um americano, mas no Brasil

105

ns sempre fomos acostumados a dizer que no podemos." (LUCIANA COELHO,

RODRIGO MATTOS E SRGIO RANGEL)

Text 14

Folha de S.Paulo October 3, 2009

Olimpada de 2016 ser no Rio
Cidade vence Madri em votao final do Comit e sera a 1a da Amrica do
Sul a sediar Jogos Olmpicos
Lula chora e diz ter vivido um de seus dias mais emocionantes; evento vai
custar R$ 28 bi ao pas
O Rio de Janeiro foi escolhido como sede da Olimpada de 2016, aps bater Madri
por larga vantagem (66 a 32) no ltimo turno da votao do Comit Olmpico
Internacional, em Copenhague (Dinamarca). Antes, o Rio j havia superado Chicago,
eliminada no primeiro turno, e Tquio, no segundo. a primeira vez que uma cidade
da Amrica do Sul receber uma Olimpada marcada para depois da segunda Copa
no Brasil, em 2014.
O presidente Luiz Incio Lula da Silva chorou com a escolha e disse ter vivido
talvez o dia mais emocionante de sua vida. Sempre achei que tinha alguma coisa
que faltava ao Brasil. Por sermos um pas colonizado, a gente tem mania de pensar
pequeno, disse o presidente, que assistiu votao ao lado do governador do Rio,
Srgio Cabral, e do prefeito Eduardo Paes (ambos do PMDB). Os Jogos devem custar
R$ 28 bilhes ao pas.
A escolha do Rio refletiu a diviso do COI entre o grupo de seu atual presidente,
Jacques Rogge, que apoiou veladamente o Brasil, e o do ex-presidente Juan Antonio
Samaranch, cujo filho chefiava a campanha por Madri. A viagem de Barack Obama
Dinamarca no evitou a eliminao de Chicago, base do presidente dos EUA. Num
dia fraco nos mercados mundiais, a escolha do Rio fez a Bovespa fechar com alta de
1,18%.
106

Text 15

Folha de S.Paulo October 3, 2009

RUY CASTRO
Cidade feliz
RIO DE JANEIRO - H tempos, escrevi num livro que, assim como os londrinos
so bons em txi, guarda-chuva, pigarro, cachorro e conscincia de classe, e os
parisienses, em baguete, boina, livro usado, cigarro sem filtro e bid, o carioca sempre
se orgulhou de seu know-how em botequim, sandlia de dedo, frescobol, caldinho de
feijo e botar apelido nos outros. Pois logo poder somar outro item a seu currculo:
organizar grandes competies esportivas.
O Rio receber os Jogos Mundiais Militares em 2011, a Copa das Confederaes
em 2013, a Copa do Mundo em 2014 (abrigar, entre outros, o jogo final, alm de ser
sede da seleo, da Fifa e do centro de imprensa) e, agora, a Olimpada e a ParaOlimpada em 2016. Ou seja, h espao na agenda para 2012 e 2015. E, at que se
acenda a chama olmpica, ainda teremos sete Carnavais e outros tantos veres e
Rveillons.
Estamos numa mar boa. Nos ltimos meses, o Rio ganhou o ttulo de "cidade
mais feliz do mundo" (segundo pesquisa de um instituto americano com 10 mil
pessoas em 20 pases), foi considerado (pelos entendidos) o "melhor destino gay do
mundo" e se tornou a primeira cidade da Amrica do Sul a merecer uma edio do
Guia Verde Michelin, com 20 lugares agraciados com a cotao mxima de trs
estrelas e 40 com duas.
Junte a isso a boa colocao do Rio como polo nacional do audiovisual e de
pesquisa acadmica nas reas de sade, biologia, biotecnologia, petrleo, astronomia
e humanas em geral -e, acrescento eu, da baixa gastronomia, conceito criado aqui e
irradiado para as demais potncias- para entender como, depois de tanto apanhar,

107

nossa autoestima tem melhorado muito. Mas, como diria o carioca Noel Rosa, o Rio
no quer abafar ningum. S quer mostrar que faz Olimpada to bem.

Text 16

Folha de S.Paulo October 3, 2009

Gente GRANDE
Rio supera Madri, Tquio e Chicago e sediar Jogos de 2016
Em deciso histrica, COI d a Olimpada para a Amrica do Sul
Com vitria, Brasil vira pas de primeira classe, afirma Lula
LUCIANA COELHO SRGIO RANGEL RODRIGO MATTOS
ENVIADOS ESPECIAIS A COPENHAGUE
Demorou cerca de dez minutos a votao do COI (Comit Olmpico Internacional)
que tornou o Rio de Janeiro sede dos Jogos de 2016. Demorou 17 anos para o Brasil
concretizar o sonho olmpico. Demorou 113 anos para a Amrica do Sul ter direito a
receber o maior evento multiesportivo do planeta.
Por 66 a 32, o Rio bateu Madri no ltimo turno de votao. Chicago foi
surpreendentemente eliminada na primeira rodada, e Tquio, na segunda. Os Jogos
Olmpicos no Brasil acontecero de 5 a 21 de agosto.
A deciso tornar o Brasil o centro esportivo mundial na prxima dcada: a Copa
de 2014 j estava garantida.
Isso ocorre num momento em que o pas obtm avanos na economia e cresce na
poltica externa. Emocionado, o presidente Luiz Incio Lula da Silva declarou o
enterro do complexo de vira-latas no pas.
"Por sermos um pas colonizado, a gente tem mania de pensar pequeno. Hoje, o
Brasil conquistou a cidadania internacional. Quebramos o ltimo preconceito.
108

Provamos que temos competncia para fazer a Olimpada. Samos do patamar de

segunda classe para primeira. Respeito bom. Ns damos, mas gostamos de
receber."
Ao deixar de pensar pequeno, o Brasil ter de gastar s nos Jogos Olmpicos e
Paraolmpicos pelo menos US$ 14,3 bilhes (R$ 25,9 bilhes), oramento inicial do
projeto, o maior entre as concorrentes.
A maior parte ser da Unio.
O Brasil ainda teve que dar garantias financeiras estatais ao COI e mostrar que seu
crescimento sustentar os Jogos.
Foi o nico dos quatro pases a levar o seu presidente do Banco Central, Henrique
Meirelles, ao COI. Foi ainda o pas que mais investiu em consultorias para elaborar
um dossi.
"O Rio foi humilde e aprendeu quando perdeu para 2012. Agora, ganhou", disse o
presidente do COI, Jacques Rogge.
Naquele processo, a cidade brasileira foi eliminada ainda pelo primeiro relatrio
tcnico. Sobre sua desclassificao em 2005, o presidente da Rio-2016, Carlos Arthur
Nuzman, contou que foi procurar o dirigente mximo do comit no dia seguinte para
pedir conselhos.
"Agradeci, porque realmente no estvamos preparados", reconheceu Nuzman, que
ganha status no mundo olmpico e poltico. O Brasil j tinha perdido trs candidaturas
aos Jogos -a primeira em 1992, com Braslia, que nem mesmo chegou a ser avaliada
pelo COI.
Esse aspecto tcnico foi acompanhado de negociao poltica do presidente Lula e
de Nuzman em reas de influncia do governo brasileiro, como a frica e Amrica
Latina.
Aos membros do COI foi pedida a primeira Olimpada na Amrica do Sul. O
argumento, a transformao do pas. Primeiros efeitos: j amainou um trauma, mudou
um discurso.

109

Text 17

Folha de S.Paulo October 3, 2009

"Choro", Lula troca tenso por lgrimas
Presidente diz que viveu um dia dos mais emocionantes
DOS ENVIADOS A COPENHAGUE
O leno levado ao rosto diversas vezes durante a entrevista coletiva da candidatura
vitoriosa, o rosto inchado e os olhos muitos vermelhos delataram o que seria colocado
em palavras minutos depois.
A escolha do Rio para sediar os Jogos de 2016 foi, "talvez", o dia mais
emocionante da vida do presidente Lula.
"E eu, que achava que no tinha mais motivo para emoo, porque j fiz tanta
coisa na minha vida, conheci tanta gente, pensei que no ia mais me emocionar",
disse Lula. "Mas [ao ouvir o anncio] eu era o mais emocionado e o mais choro."
O presidente disse que no aguentava olhar para o lado e ver Brbara Lencio, 17,
campe mundial juvenil de atletismo, em prantos a toda hora. E que chorou na
coletiva porque no teve "coragem de chorar durante a apresentao".
Logo Lula comearia a desfilar agradecimentos. Primeiro, pelo "carinho do
Jacques Rogge", o presidente do COI. Depois, elogiaria as apresentaes do
governador Srgio Cabral e do prefeito Eduardo Paes.
Na ponta da bancada, Paes no se continha. Antes de assinar o contrato do Rio
como sede, erguia a caneta como um trofu ou uma tocha olmpica.
No fim da entrevista, abordado no palco pela reportagem mais uma vez, o
presidente respondeu com um tapinha na cabea. "Vamos dar um tempo para a
emoo hoje", afirmou, agarrado bandeira brasileira, abraado aos demais membros
da delegao brasileira, os olhos mais uma vez marejados.

110

As lgrimas eram a catarse de trs anos de campanha concentrados em dois dias de

intensa tenso. Lula passou a vspera e o dia do anncio da sede ansioso entre
reunies, recepes e apresentaes por votos.
Antes falando pouco e evitando entrevistas, ontem no se conteve ao chegar da
apresentao no Bella Center, o pavilho onde o Comit Olmpico Internacional
promoveu os eventos de escolha da sede.
Animado e visivelmente tenso -na entrevista coletiva, ele diria que estava "quase
chorando de nervoso"- disse, primeiro, que esperaria o resultado.
Em seguida, j com a fala acelerada, animou-se com a ideia de assistir ao anncio
com os jornalistas, em vez de ficar no hotel, como planejara.
Empolgado, chegou a abraar a reprter da Folha. Elogiou o filme da
apresentao. Segundos depois, seria a vez do reprter de "O Globo". Tudo em um
intervalo de minutos.
Mas o presidente assistiria ao anncio no auditrio do Bella Center, e a mdia teria
de se contentar em v-lo pelo telo.
Quando o envelope aberto por Rogge mostrou o nome do Rio de Janeiro, foi uma
exploso do lado brasileiro da plateia. Do lado de fora do auditrio, a gritaria foi
semelhante.
As mulheres dos membros da delegao subiam em cadeiras. Jornalistas invadiam
a rea interditada. Relatando reportagem o que acontecia no auditrio, um dos
presentes disse Folha que a situao era "indescritvel" e de "muita, muita emoo"
entre os ministros, polticos, diplomatas, assessores. " s choro."
Ao fundo, um grito vindo de uma voz grave e embargada tomou o ambiente. "Ns
ganhamos, porra!" (LUCIANA COELHO, RODRIGO MATTOS E SRGIO
RANGEL)

Text 18

111

Folha de S.Paulo October 3, 2009

Festa tem protesto, suvenir estatal e at falta de chope
Show em Copacabana rene cerca de 50 mil pessoas, que recebem cartazes da
Petrobras para comemorar a vitria Com atraes ofuscadas por anncios em
Copenhague, evento atrai de pagador de promessas a ex-servidores do Samu
criticando governo

Text 19

Folha de S.Paulo October 4, 2009

Com a Olimpada, Brasil pode superar "vira-latice"
Para especialistas, realizao dos Jogos oportunidade para derrubar
complexo
Vitria pe pas como polo nas relaes internacionais, mas sucesso esportivo
e na organizao sero decisivos para consolidar autoestima
LEONARDO CRUZ MARIANA BASTOS
DA REPORTAGEM LOCAL
"Deixamos de ser um pas de segunda classe. Ganhamos a cidadania
internacional", bradava o presidente Lula logo aps a escolha do Rio como sede dos
Jogos Olmpicos de 2016.
Para alguns especialistas consultados pela Folha, a declarao de Lula em
Copenhague simboliza um processo de projeo do pas no cenrio internacional e
ajuda a alimentar o esprito ufanista que dominou os discursos da comitiva brasileira
em Copenhague.
Seria a superao do "complexo de vira-latas"? O termo cunhado pelo cronista
Nelson Rodrigues expressa "a inferioridade em que o brasileiro se coloca,
voluntariamente, em face do resto do mundo".
112

"O complexo de vira-latas j virou complexo de cocker spaniel", analisa Sergio

Miceli, professor de sociologia da USP.
"A escolha do Rio tem grande repercusso por lidar com o esporte, algo de grande
interesse nacional e internacional. Mas a autoestima do brasileiro j melhorou nos
ltimos anos por causa de uma srie de indicadores econmicos e sociais positivos",
completa Miceli.
Nos ltimos anos, o Brasil consolidou sua posio como principal lder regional
nas negociaes com EUA e Europa.
Alm disso, foi um dos articuladores do fortalecimento do G20, o grupo das 20
maiores economias do mundo, como palco de negociaes internacionais, em
detrimento do G8.
Para se afirmarem definitivamente no cenrio internacional, muitos pases
emergentes, como o Brasil, usaram a Olimpada como instrumento.
Nas ltimas dcadas, os casos mais emblemticos so os da Coreia do Sul e da
China.
Em 1988, os sul-coreanos demonstraram sua pujana econmica como tigre
asitico ao sediarem a Olimpada de Seul.
Vinte anos depois, foi a vez dos chineses. Eles exibiram os Jogos mais exuberantes
de todos os tempos diante de 4,4 bilhes de espectadores. Gastaram cerca de US$ 40
bilhes e seu principal legado foi imaterial. A China exibiu-se para o mundo todo
como uma das maiores potncias atuais.
Para especialistas, o Brasil segue uma trajetria similar. "A mdia d uma
visibilidade csmica aos Jogos. Em um mundo no qual se opera muito com a imagem,
isso [sediar uma Olimpada] tem um impacto colossal", declara o economista Carlos
Lessa.
O pas, alis, encerra o ciclo de grandes eventos esportivos sediados pelos Bric
(Brasil, Rssia, ndia e China), pases emergentes, em uma dcada.

113

Aps Pequim-08, haver em 2010, em Nova Dli (ndia), os Jogos da Comunidade

Britnica. Quatro anos depois, o Brasil sediar a Copa do Mundo, e Sochi, na Rssia,
a Olimpada de Inverno. Em 2016, o Rio de Janeiro complementa o ciclo.
"No que o Brasil tenha virado uma potncia, mas a escolha do Rio para sediar a
Olimpada mais um indicador do rearranjo da posio brasileira no mundo. a
cereja do bolo," afirma Srgio Miceli.
Anteontem, inclusive, paralelamente comemorao nas ruas do Rio, milhares de
brasileiros demonstravam com humor seu otimismo na internet.
O termo "Yes, we cru" -pardia ao "Yes, we can", do presidente americano
Barack Obama- virou hit no Twitter, microblog usado no mundo inteiro. Sempre
associado Olimpada no Rio, ele liderou a lista de expresses mais usadas durante
toda a sexta-feira.
Para o antroplogo carioca Gilberto Velho, a sensao de ufanismo e
deslumbramento do povo vem acompanhada ainda por uma certa desconfiana sobre
a capacidade de o pas obter ganhos materiais por abrigar os Jogos Olmpicos.
"Sa nas ruas de Ipanema hoje [anteontem] tarde para sentir o esprito e vi que as
pessoas esto animadas. Mas tem muita gente ctica, muita gente preocupada por
causa de experincias anteriores", diz Velho, em referncia ao Pan de 2007, cujo
oramento foi de R$ 3,7 bilhes, muito superior ao originalmente estimado.
"O Pan foi muito frustrante para muita gente. Houve desde o no cumprimento de
promessas bsicas at o desvio de recursos financeiros. Coisas que foram
abandonadas. Ento, espera-se que no haja nada similar na Olimpada porque isso
gera uma desmoralizao. D muito medo", pontua.
Mesmo que o pas se saia bem na organizao dos Jogos, ainda h a possibilidade
de o brasileiro voltar a assumir o complexo de vira-latas. Para o historiador Manolo
Florentino, o pas ter que ter um xito similar no mbito esportivo.
"O brasileiro no aceita ser segundo colocado", avalia o professor da Universidade
Federal do Rio de Janeiro.

114

"Se a escolha do Rio infla o ego nacional agora, o desempenho do pas na

competio de 2016 tem grande chance de causar um sentimento de frustrao,
porque improvvel que o pas se mostre uma potncia olmpica", completa.
Foi justamente essa frustrao, advinda de uma das maiores derrotas brasileiras
dentro de campo, que fez Nelson Rodrigues criar o termo "complexo de vira-latas". O
revs diante do Uruguai na final Copa de 1950, justamente o ltimo grande evento
esportivo sediado no Brasil, deixou o pas atnito e criou o Maracanazo.
"Perdemos da maneira mais abjeta. Por um motivo muito simples: porque Obdulio
[Varela, capito uruguaio] nos tratou a pontaps, como se vira- -latas fssemos",
afirmava a crnica de Nelson Rodrigues.

Text 20

Folha de S.Paulo October 5, 2009

FERNANDO DE BARROS E SILVA
O nosso Misha
SO PAULO - Os que j rondam a casa dos 40 devem se lembrar do urso Misha,
o mais simptico dos mascotes da histria olmpica. Ganhou o mundo em 1980, em
Moscou, e foi eternizado na imagem em que aparecia vertendo lgrimas de adeus, na
coreografia de encerramento dos jogos, no estdio Lnin.
Sim, eram outros tempos, ainda existia comunismo e Guerra Fria. Os EUA
lideraram o boicote de 61 pases festa em solo sovitico. Mas Misha sobreviveu ao
regime caduco cuja grandeza deveria simbolizar. Por ironia, o sucesso fez do ursinho
comunista um precursor do consumo associado aos eventos esportivos, um cone de
vanguarda da colonizao do esporte pelo dinheiro. Hoje, a fofura estaria sendo
disputada a tapa pelas marcas globais.
Lula o Misha dos novos tempos. A comunidade internacional est encantada com
seu mascote. Quando o mundo capitalista busca um rosto humano, Lula lhe oferece
115

um espelho possvel. A imagem guarda relao tnue com a vida real no pas, mas
quem se importa?
A elite financeira aplaude nossas polticas comportadas. E Lula retribui com o
show da informalidade brasileira, uma vantagem comparativa. Sim, somos confiveis.
Mas tambm sentimentais e efusivos. Choramos espontaneamente, sem truques
coreogrficos. E debochamos do nosso prprio xito: "Yes, we cru!". No h quem
resista.
Ao longo do perodo de declnio histrico do Rio, o pas cultivou uma certa
"poesia da favela", procurando transformar tragdia social em atrao turstica. O
excesso de p, munio pesada e balas perdidas turvou essa aquarela.
Lula agora promete converter os morros cariocas em bairros, com casas de
alvenaria. Oxal! E drogas, como diz a cano, s se compravam na drogaria...
Veremos, daqui em diante, tomar corpo a verso olmpica do mito nativo do
futebol como veculo mgico de ascenso social.
Sob os braos abertos do Cristo Redentor, s o esporte salva.

116

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