Literatura negra-africana: um conceito de corpo e ancestralidade

Abstract

The terminologies that conceptualize Black literature—that is, literature that addresses Black themes and is written by Black people—in Brazil vary among many issues. The main one is the variation in the terms "Afro" and "Negro" in their prefixes, justified by the identity of the Black person, according to Cuti and his term "Black-Brazilian literature"; and by the African heritage in the term "Afro-Brazilian literature," according to Eduardo de Assis Duarte. Questions about affectivity and enchantment also play a part in the distinction of this nomenclature by demarcating the centrality of the approaches that should predominate in the narrative, as is the case with Sônia Rosa's Black-affective literature; Kiussam de Oliveira's Black-Brazilian literature of enchantment; and Marcos Cajé's Afro-affective literature. The geographical inclusion or exclusion of the term "Brazilian" is also a topic for discussion in the conceptualization of this term, considering Brazilian production and the historical and social particularities that constitute this literature. Considering the impact of nomenclatures in the academic environment, especially in schools, this article aims to offer a new perspective by adopting and defending Black-African terminology in characterizing literature produced by Black authors in Brazil, based on a dialogue with Molefi Kete Asante's principles of Afrocentricity, Cuti's notion of identity added to the African worldview of the body in conceptualizing Black literature. Understanding that no single concept is sufficient to encompass the complexity of Black literary productions in Brazil, this article seeks to broaden existing understandings, particularly with reference to the terms proposed by Duarte, Cuti, and Sônia Rosa, proposing reflections on how Africa configures the Black body, both as a legacy of African heritage in oral literature and as a non-dichotomized body intrinsic to affection, science, and knowledge. Thus, to consider Black-African literature is to unite: "Black," based on the principles of corporeality and the transversal notion of body of the African worldview; and “African”, in order to mark the original psychological agency of knowledge, according to the principles of Asante's Afrocentricity, to characterize the productions of black literature that correspond to the representation of the humanized, intellectual, affective black body, highlighting the singularities that differentiate black corporeality from the diaspora and racial consciousness, relationships with the environment, politics and culture, considering worldview and psychological location in Africa.