Quem não gosta de samba... não é doente do pé: Carnaval e Futebol em Belo Horizonte

Resumo

Carnival and football are two widely recognized symbols of national identity in modern Brazil. The history of how this identification was constructed is an extremely interesting field for the study of the relationship between culture and politics in our society. Disseminated and made legitimate by the city of Rio de Janeiro in the first decades of the 20th century and incorporated in different ways along the several regions of Brazil, both manifestations personified tensions and mediations which were fundamental for the definition of a certain image of national community. In Belo Horizonte these two cultural manifestations had very different outcomes. If football became immensely popular and an important part of life in the city, carnival does not seem to have found a relevant place in its culture. Investigating and discussing the reasons for this difference may be an interesting exercise to reflect on the imperfect, excluding and temporary character of national identity, as well as on the different nuances taken on by the process of cultural modernization in Brazilian society