A fé contra o crime: A bakhtinian analysis of the image of evangelicals in Brazil in the cover of Veja magazine

The present paper, based on the concept of surplus of vision discussed in some works of the bakhtinian Circle, as, mainly Bakhtin (2010a) and Bakhtin (2010b), has the main aim to analyse the image of evangelicals in a cover delivered by Veja magazine from the bakhtinian categories of exotopy, otherness and expressive intonation and, consequently, the meaning effects resulting from them. Therefore, anchored by the perspective of Bakhtinian Studies (BS), we analysed the magazine cover, seeking to apprehend the meanings constructed by this genre of verb-visual basis. To the constitution of the corpus of analysis, we selected the cover of the edition 1555, published on July, 15, 1998, entitled A fé contra o crime: Numa cruzada em presídios e redutos de traficantes, os evangélicos estão convertendo bandidos em soldados de Jesus, to analyse in which way the magazine, from its discursive place, appropriates the image of the evangelicals and represents it with its intonations in its statements. From the analysis, we can state that Veja constructs an image that tends to the homogenization of the evangelicals in Brazil, from its surplus of vision, with its tone of sarcasm, prejudice and vilification of this group, attempting to position the consumer/reader of Veja against the protestant sphere. The conclusion of this research, therefore, is that the exotopic position assumed by Veja with regard to its otherness, the evangelical discursive sphere, articulates axiologic aprehensions materialized in the form of intonation on the cover of the magazine that we analysed, disseminating, with the character of truth, the protestant group as integrant of mere dualities. Although the cover figures the group as an agent of change in society, this change gets the intonation by the magazine so that it seems false or, at least, incomplete, which equips the Veja readers of mistrust and, therefore, discredit to the actions of the discussed discursive sphere.

The Role of the Image in the Press Media – The Subject in Agony of a Party

This article deals with the functioning of images in the press media discourse. For so, we take the French Discourse Analysis proposed by Pêcheux as theoretical support and make use of the notions of subject, meaning, intericonicity and policromy. Problems of the analysis at this level in the French Discourse Analysis are pointed out, especially because of the need for new theoretical devices which are able to analyze the image objects adequately. After this contextualization, a brief analysis of the article The Agony of a Political Party, published by Veja Magazine in 2005, will be done and which deals with the supposed kickback crisis and the Brazilian Labor Party. It is impossible, in our understanding, to make any analysis of the verbal text adequately and pertinently separating it from the non-verbal text; thus, both the linguistic  and non-linguistic plans will be analyzed together in this proposition.

About meanings and subjects: the prosperity in the “metropolis of the future”

This study has the objective of analyzing, based on the theoretical and methodological device of the French Discourse Analysis, the meanings that (are) produce(d) (in) the photographs that compose the special report entitled “Cidades médias” (“Medium-sized cities”), published by Veja magazine in September, 2010. This report aims, according to the magazine, at highlighting which are the Brazilian cities that are considered “metropolis of the future”, for making possible, amongst other elements, also the obtainment of financial success. If the photographs in the media act as supports of the linguistic materiality, as representations of reality, I intend in this study: work with the effect of evidence produced by the photograph; reflect about the ideological crossing, which determines what can and must be said and, therefore, what cannot and must not be said; analyze in what way this crossing passes by the image and what is its representation in the journalistic discourse; and analyze which are the meanings produced by the photographs that compose the special report on Veja magazine; also in their relation to the subjects introduced there. For my investigation, I was based on the contributions of Barthes (1984) and Dubois (1993) and in some important concepts for the Discourse Analysis field found in Pêcheux (2009 [1988]) and Orlandi (2007 [1992]; 1995).

THE CONSTITUTION OF SUBJECTS AND MEANINGS: THE CASE OF THE QUOTAS FOR BLACK PEOPLE

ABSTRACT: In this study, I bring aspects that are related to the constitution of subjects and meanings, according to the French Discourse Analysis approach. As for that, I use four discursive sequences – corpus – taken from articles about quotas for black people published in Veja magazine. The main objective in this study is to discuss and relate theoretical propositions of the French Discourse Analysis about the constitution of the subject and of the meaning with the corpus for analysis, which composes a research recently concluded. The work is mainly based in the studies of Pêcheux (2009 [1988]). Under the theoretical perspective of the French Discourse Analysis, we may affirm that the subject is considered an effect of external processes which constitute him and which, meanwhile, erase this mechanism. The referred constitution results in the evidence that the subject is the origin, the controller of the meanings he expresses, or that are produced through his saying. Thus, it will be possible to ask “how or why is the subject an effect?” and “how can he not be the origin and the source of what is enunciated, if every person can only think about himself as being a subject (I am… I think…)?”. It is guided by these questions that I develop the observations of the referred approach.   KEYWORDS: subject; meaning effects; discourse.