‘Brazil at a Crossroads’ workshop
Dr Nicole McLean
On 24th March, SOLL’s new Spanish and Latin American Studies (SLAS) Roundtable Research Hub, founded by Dr Ralph Newmark, hosted its first event of the year, the ‘Brazil at a Crossroads’ workshop. The half-day workshop was run by Dr Nicole McLean (UoM) and Dr Deborah Barros Leal Farias (UNSW), which connected 10 Australian-based researchers interested in Brazilian politics.
The theme of the workshop was ‘politics’, broadly defined, including discussions related to law, public policy, political economy, federal and subnational issues, historical processes, and changing cultural dynamics.
The guest speaker at the workshop was Márcio Moretto Ribeiro, a Brazilian professor of Information Systems at the University of São Paulo (USP). Márcio is co-leader of the political science research group at USP called Monitor, which analyses political discourse on social media and the formation of different publics in Brazilian society. He gave a presentation on the current state of polarisation in Brazil, which is being driven by young progressives who despise Bolsonaro, President of Brazil, and are against the older generation of conservatives.
This workshop was the first of a series of events focused on Brazil as part of the Brazilian Protests and Politics discussion group at UoM. Stay tuned for more updates on this discussion group throughout the year in the lead-up to the 2022 Brazilian elections in October.