ABSTRACT Title of Document: HISTORY, IDENTITY AND THE STRUGGLE FOR LAND IN NORTHEASTERN BRAZIL, 1955 - 1985 Sarah R. Sarzynski, Doctor of Philosophy, 2008 Directed By: Barbara Weinstein, Department of History, New York University University of Maryland, College Park Drawing from Edward Said, Durval Muniz de Albuquerque Junior has argued that through a repetition of texts and images, Northeastern Brazil was “nordestinizado,” or turned into an imagined area of misery, violence, folklore, fanaticism, and rebellion that became the Other of the modern, urban center-south of Brazil. My research builds on Albuquerque’s arguments about the construction of o Nordeste in the twentieth century by situating them in the milieu of political and cultural debates that attempted to redefine Northeastern Brazil during the Cold War. Rural social movements (associated with the Catholic Church, the Communist Party, and the Ligas Camponesas ), large landowners, filmmakers and intellectuals, popular poets, U.S. and Brazilian politicians and journalists, and Brazilian military officers proposed projects to change the structures that they saw as perpetuating regional inequalities. To gain support for their political projects, these social, political and cultural movements appropriated regional historical symbols and narratives, imbuing them with new meanings. In doing so, they sought to redefine regional identity, and to a certain extent, also looked to redefine national and Third World identity. During the Cold War, identity expanded to becoming a product of local, national and transnational discussions, facilitated by the expansion of film as a medium of mass culture. The debates over the meaning of regional historical symbols and regional identity in Northeastern Brazil are at once an exaggerated and exemplary microcosm of Cold War political and cultural struggles in Latin America and in the Third World. The characters in the story had counterparts in other countries, and the setting was one of the most socially unequal areas in the world espousing all of the problems and possibilities of impoverished areas during the Cold War. The struggles also occurred at a key moment in Cold War history in Latin America: the era of the Cuban Revolution. But, the Northeast was not a blank slate for Cold War policies; in fact, the region had entrenched cultural symbols and historical narratives that composed the framework for the debates over regional identity. HISTORY, IDENTITY AND THE STRUGGLE FOR LAND IN NORTHEASTERN BRAZIL, 1955 – 1985 By Sarah R. Sarzynski Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2008 Advisory Committee: Professor Barbara Weinstein, Chair Professor Mary Kay Vaughan Professor Daryle Williams Professor Saverio Giovacchini Professor Phylis Peres © Copyright by Sarah R. Sarzynski 2008 Acknowledgements First and foremost, I want to thank my advisor, Barbara Weinstein, who mentored by offering her advice and expertise but allowed me to develop my own ideas and struggle with the sources and methodologies. She encouraged my creativity and intellectual exploration throughout this process, and read and edited my chapters, helping me to figure out my issues in writing and clarity. If she was entirely as tired of reading the multiple versions of the introduction as I was, she never let on and encouraged me on those last painful revisions. Also, thanks to Mary Kay Vaughan for her warm support and critical commentary, to Saverio Giovacchini, Daryle Williams and David Gordon who all guided me to the theoretical questions of my dissertation. Also, friends at Maryland: Patricia Acerbi, Leandro Bermegui, Susanne Eineigel, Paula Halperín, Laura Lenci, Giacomo Mazzei, Linda Noel, Shari Orisich, David Sartorius. I also want to thank Bowdoin College for giving me the opportunity to teach while ABD and providing me with a reason to finish, and Mount Holyoke College for a dream job in 2008-2009. Thanks to Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad program for funding my field research, the University of Maryland for multiple grants for research and writing, and the Latin American Studies programs at Michigan State University and the University of Florida for funding my language training in Brazil through FLAS summer language programs. In Brazil, professors Eduardo Morretín (USP), Antonio Montenegro (UFPE), , and Cliff Welch provided feedback and suggested archives and sources important to my dissertation. Meus queridos amigos, Adilson, Fabio, e Ricardo, e a galera da ii cinemateca…um grande abraço! In São Paulo, thanks to the archivists at CEDEM at Unesp, the Arquivo Edgard Leuenroth at UNICAMP, the Seminario Acadêmico Audiovisual e História at USP, the Cinemateca Nacional, the Arquivo do Estado de São Paulo (DOPS), and the Banco e Itau Centro Cultural. In Rio, I want to thank the staff and archivists at Museu de Arte Moderna, FUNARTE, CPDOC at the Fundação Getúlio Vargas, and the Biblioteca Nacional. In Pernambuco, thanks to the Fundação Joaquim Nabuco and especially Anatailde de Paulo Crespo and the staff at CEHIBRA, the library and administration at UNICAP who gave me “student” permission while in Recife to use their (air-conditioned) library resources, UFPE and UFRPE, the Arquivo Estadual and the Biblioteca Estadual de Pernambuco. I also want to thank a few other friends who helped me through this process: Nadia Celis, Karen Lindo, Cesare Cuttica, Pat Scallian, Bryna Keenan Subherwal, Lisa Schwartz, Son Tran, Rebecca Sager. And, remembering my own sense of regional identity, a big thank you to my Oregon friends for reminding me of life outside of academia: Rocket and Santi y familia, Jackie, Sandy, Tom, Cesar. Thanks to Bert Barickman, who provoked my interest in Brazilian history, my dissertation topic and who has always been there as a mentor and friend throughout the years. When writing got tough I remembered those sleepless nights of frantically trying to learn enough Portuguese to read scholarly articles and books with enough comprehension to write a paper and “raise issues” for discussion, and recognized that all of this is a process of learning and facing new challenges. I want to thank my mom who supported me emotionally and financially even though she had no idea what I was doing. She believed I could finish when I was iii skeptical. I saw Brazil from an entirely different perspective when she came to visit me. Without speaking a word of Portuguese, I was continually surprised to find her engaged in a conversation about the suntanned star of the current telenovela, giggling about a bump on an elevator ride, laughing after being passed a cow hoof filled with cachaça on a bus, being surrounded by teenage girls in transit to a passion play who thought she was a movie star, or having a street vendor showing her pictures of his family. Brazilians could just read her positive energy – language wasn’t important – and this is something I will always hold close to remind me of the positive forces that connect us to one another on this earth. And to Shervin, who I coerced on those many long bus rides, on neck crunching truck rides, and on moto-taxis throughout the sertão and the Northeast in pursuit of Lampião and religious fanatics. He listened and fought, laughed and told me when I was wrong (and when I was right), and read drafts again and again. From being Señor (and Saddam) Chocolate to being “o negro” in the sertão, Shervs, you were always there for me. iv Table of Contents Acknowledgements....................................................................................................... ii Table of Contents.......................................................................................................... v List of Illustrations…………………………………………………………………... vi Chapter 1: Introduction................................................................................................. 1 Chapter 2: O Nordeste: Regionalism, Nationalism and Third Worldism During the Cold War..................................................................................................................... 30 Chapter 3: “Evolution or Revolution”: The Battle Against Underdevelopment ...... 103 Chapter 4: Slavery, Abolition, and Quilombos : Racialized Narratives of Resistance ................................................................................................................................... 177 Chapter 5: The Return of Lampião to the Terra do Sol , 1955-1965......................... 244 Chapter 6: From the Memory of Messianic Wars to a Radical Jesus...................... 289 Chapter 7: Conclusion............................................................................................... 362 Chapter 8: Epilogue: Re-membering the Ligas Camponesas in the Transition to Democracy, 1978-1985............................................................................................. 373 Appendices ………………………………………………………………………... 460 Bibliography ............................................................................................................. 458 v List of Illustrations Figure Page 1. Drawing in LIGA 13 November 1962, p.3 …………………………...... 195 2. Cartoon in LIGA 6 November 1963, p.6……………………………….. 218 3. Photograph: “Da Casa-Grande Massangana” Diario de Pernambuco, 31 July 1963, p.3…………………………………………….…. 235 4. Glauber Rocha, Deus e o diabo na terra do sol , 1964……….………… 300 5. Fernando de Barros,