"Todo mundo bole": samba, metalinguagem e autorreferenciação

Abstract

In this essay, we present the preliminary results of the ongoing research “Todo mundo bole – Samba and metalanguage: identity and cultural resistance”. Aware of the vast recurrence in samba lyrics of metalinguistic self-reference to this genre in the Brazilian popular songbook, particularly in Rio de Janeiro's urban samba (cf. LIMA, 2022), our investigation approaches the characteristic mark of metapoetry in occidental literary modernity, with its unsettling questioning about the poetic act itself, the samba artist’s exercise in reflecting, in his songs, on his own samba making. Referring to them as “metasambas”, we analyze the metalinguistic incidence in such lyrics as an exercise, sometimes in praising and affirming Brazilianness, sometimes in questioning their poetic nature, sometimes as a search for their Afro-diasporic identity and singularity. From a diachronic perspective, we follow the repeated presence of this aspect throughout the 20th century, from the origins of “maxixado samba” in the 1900s to contemporary times. For this work, we present the working methodology used, the bibliographical review on samba, modernity and metalanguage and a brief historical overview of the 20th century, highlighting the constant recurrence of metasambas in the social history of samba.