The production of an uncertain encyclopedia: linguistic politics and the projection of a discipline

Abstract

Driven by Discourse Analysis, History of Linguistic Theories and History of the Book, this articles approaches how the project of publishing an encyclopedia by the Instituto Nacional do Livro, founded in Getúlio Vargas’ regime to produce it, can, despite the inconclusion of the project, give life to the oficial discourse not only about language, but also about language studies. The encyclopedia articles should be written and published respecting the Norma 32-3/11, termed the Instruções Gerais para os verbetes de Linguística e Filologia, dateless (but probably from the 1950s). Such document should serve as a guideline to encyclopedic writing, affirming itself as the rule to the elaboration of the first Brazilian encyclopedia. Therefore, it will be possible to watch how an official instrument, a Brazilian governmental instrument, produced the image of linguistic studies throughout the country, beginning with the parallelism between Linguistics and Filology, two disciplines sometimes in opposition sometimes in relationship until very recently. Besides, we reflect analytically how the Reading practices are related to the publishing of encyclopedias in Brazil, from its empire time until the period known as Estado Novo.

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http://dx.doi.org/10.12957/matraga.2016.21225