From Mary to Isabel, from silence to screaming: no more male chauvinism in the scene and in the verses of the cordel

Abstract

This paper focuses on the struggles faced by the cordel poets to abolish sexist discourses and posture among the scenario of Brazilian cordel literature. Therefore, sex and gender must be contextualized in order to understand how every female body has embodied within, this social construction that insists on dictating what a woman has to be like and what she can or cannot do. There are approaches of other methodological practices for the study of oral poetry/ of the voice (MATOS, 2018) and the reflections that call into question the discussions related to gender relations, reformulating the conceptions of the so called: western white feminism (OYEWÙMÍ, 2021). Forged by oral tradition and made to be sung from square to square,from one street fair to the other, Brazilian cordel literature, until recently, was a field that was mainly dominated by males, and this could not have been any different, after all, for the longest time women did not have any voice. Until not long ago, they had no right to vote nor were they allowed to access higher education. It was unthinkable then, to have a female producing poetry, and thus raising its voice throughout the squares and street fairs of the country. Therefore, perhaps, this is one of the reasons for the lack of women's voices in the scenario of cordel literature for many years. However, this reality has been changing and many female voices have been raised and have since then, been dominating this field of literature as a cry out to the end male chauvinism in the verses and in the scenario of the Brazilian cordel.