A Festa Imaculada Conceição : uma análise da tradição centenária no distrito da Passagem da Conceição (MT)

Abstract

This dissertation's theme is the Imaculada Conceição festival, a centuries-old cultural event that has taken place annually, since 1910, in Passagem da Conceição, a district belonging to the Municipality of Várzea Grande/MT. The problem that guided the construction of this research is related to the different facets that this festive tradition has experienced over time. Firstly, we present and situate some fundamental data about the past of this festival, in order to understand how and to what extent a tradition was established in the community. In a second moment, we investigate another facet of this tradition, located in the present. In it we analyze the symbolic struggles that are being waged around this festival, which became more visible through the attempt to renew religious control exercised by the clergy of the Nossa Senhora da Conceição Church. The third facet highlighted is that which points to the future, being marked by fear regarding the possible end of the tradition, due to the process of weakening and loss of dynamism that it has been experiencing in recent years. The body of sources and methods used in this research included: field research through participant observation, which covered the preparations and holding of the 112th and 113th edition of the Imaculada Conceição festival; oral history, through interviews with social actors in the community; and iconographic records produced by me or provided by the residents. Finally, the main concepts used in the research – problematized from theorists from different areas of knowledge – were: popular festivals; tradition; memory; popular culture; modernity; presenteeism and secularization.