The ghetto narrator: marginality and engagement in Ferrèz literature

Abstract

This article begins by the polemic involving the self-declared marginality of writers from the periphery regimented by Ferréz. After that, it searches to contextualize the movement and points out the rules of its manifest. And, yet in the introductory part, it details the conception of marginality contained in the aggressive speech, the symbolic layout of breaking the door instead of asking for passage, taking the word (written) of assault. Opposed to distrust and resistance concerning the self-declared marginality, the article, then, proposes as an analysis key a term taken from its own manifest: ghetto. In that order, it treats the reality of Capão Redondo, a poor district of São Paulo city, where Ferréz grew up and still lives, including the northeastern migration history, segregation and violence. Soon later, it becomes the theoretical reference elaborated by the French sociologist Löic Wacquant, who defines ghetto from both sides, as the dominating weapon and as the dominated shield. In applying this concept to Capão Pecado work, Ferréz's first novel, the article draws up the concept of being the ghetto narrator: a local narrator, with hybrid language (speaking, slangs, rap and standard rule), engaged in the cause of the periphery.