Abstract
The history of samba schools has been frequently written in associationwith carnival events and matters, focusing, for instance, on institutional organization of parades or on samba-enredo poetics. I would like to propose a different approach: in order to get a more intimate perception about these associations, one may inquire which meanings and feelings they evoke for their own artists and communities, when considered off and beyond the monumental scene of carnival competitions. The main corpus of this research is composed by a hundred of sambas-de-meio-de-ano (those that are not performed in carnival parades) speaking about the two most traditional samba schools: Portela and Mangueira. In comparative perspective, I try to identify metaphoric and symbolic nets, features and motives that constitute the self-image of schools and their communities. What analysis may bring to the light, then, is not a triumphant face displayed to public on the avenue or TV screen, but a familiar look shaped by communitarian psychosocial signs and revealed through the poetic-musical discourse of samba.
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