Founding myths, collective memory, and narratives: children’s perspectives on Brazil

Abstract

This article aims to understand which elements of Brazil’s founding myths are (re)appropriated by fifth-grade students at a public elementary school and how these narratives contribute to the construction of meanings concerning national identity, social relations, and coexistence. A qualitative study, complemented by descriptive quantitative data, was conducted at a municipal school in the interior of the state of São Paulo, involving 103 students from five classes and five teachers. Data were collected through questionnaires comprising open- and closed-ended questions and semi-structured interviews and were examined using descriptive procedures, thematic analysis, and source triangulation. The results reveal widespread recognition of racism, including within the school environment, coexisting with discourses of equality and racial mixing. In the religious sphere, the apparent harmonious coexistence among different religious affiliations contrasted with the lower visibility of Umbanda. Recognition of expressions associated with narratives of Brazil as a “country blessed by God,” the “country of the future,” and a country characterized by the jeitinho was also low, although elements of their symbolic content emerged in the data. The findings indicate that unfamiliarity with established formulations does not necessarily imply the disappearance of their symbolic content, just as recognizing them does not necessarily entail adherence. The study concludes that founding myths do not persist as intact narratives but are appropriated, contested, and resignified, highlighting the school as a space where meanings about Brazilian society circulate and are negotiated.