Abstract
Abstract This paper seeks to analyse the role played by the various formal dimensions of a critique in its effectuation. In order to do so, we draw on a set of different fieldwork studies, coordinated by a framework of typologies of these dimensions. On the one hand, we explore the critiques made by residents of a Rio de Janeiro favela concerning the power company that began to operate more intensively in the local area after installation of a Police Pacification Unit (UPP). On the other hand, we analyse how critiques can be operated in a joking way, both modulated - that is, continuously adjusted to avoid critical moments - and accusatory, as observed primarily in posters from the 2013 and 2014 political demonstrations that employed humour to mock the political situation of the country. This approach allowed us to understand the key elements of the critique-form, which in turn enabled us to design a typology of 15 relevant dimensions for the critique to be realized,- distributed between metamoral, aesthetic and logical dimensions.
Highlights
On the poster we can see the former soccer player Pelé, wearing regal attire, being ironized
Alexandre Werneck analyses, through a series of empirical fronts, how critique operates in two different registers: in some situations, in a modulated form, that is, adjusted continuously to avoid the formation of fully critical moments (Boltanski & Thévenot, 1991), which is observed by him in playful everyday practices known as zoações, ‘teasings’ (Werneck, 2015, 2016); in others, accusatory in form, it is explored especially in the observation of banners from the 2013 demonstrations throughout Brazil, which used humour to criticize the political situation of the country8 (Werneck, 2018)
The elements of the critique-form are presented with some precision: we clearly see the victim/critic and the criticized; we see persecution, that is, the identified problem; we see the elements of proof
Summary
CRITIQUE-FORM, FORMS OF CRITIQUE: the different dimensions of the discourse of discontent sociol. antropol. | rio de janeiro, v.08.03: 973 – 1008, sep.– dec., 2018. The elements of the critique-form are presented with some precision: we clearly see the victim/critic (the resident) and the criticized (the power company Light, implicit in the above comments, but present in the situation, since they were made in front of a company customer support trailer, installed in the square at the entry to the favela); we see persecution, that is, the identified problem (a scandalous difference in charges between residents with similar levels of consumption); we see the elements of proof (the billing amounts, presented alongside the bills paid by the resident from another area, showing the huge difference; the difference in the price of the Street Lighting Levy, despite the latter service being identified as weak in the favela). Newspaper reports may offer more tangible proof for the claim, but the form of critique employed in such cases does not allow – very often strategically – for use of this resource to be made: there is no and could be no proof attached to the presented critique
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