THE THEMES OF THE SMALL SAMBA SCHOOLS OF RIO DE JANEIRO

Abstract

This article is a chapter of the doctorate thesis entitled Valuing the batucada: a study of the Carioca schools of samba of access groups C, D and E, defended in 2008, which analyzes samba schools not familiar to the great public by approaching aspects such as history, socio-administrative organization, insertion in the Carioca carnival field, the relation with the big schools of the special group and with other carnival manifestations, together with parade items, costumes, allegories and theme.  This last aspect is deeply explored on a statistical survey held between the years 2005 and 2008, which had for corpus more than 100 themes, making possible to identify some patterns and characteristics. A relational analysis of the theme of the small sambas schools - having the special group for a parameter – reveals a peculiar discourse, differentiated in both form and content, but also discloses a certain difficulty in the understanding and presentation of the literary part of the theme, as well as thematic restrictions that can be reinforcing the objective and symbolic differences between big and small schools.