Overview

Speaking of Flowers is an innovative study of student activism during Brazil's military dictatorship (1964-85) and an examination of the very notion of student activism, which changed dramatically in response to the student protests of 1968. Looking into what made students engage in national political affairs as students, rather than through other means, Victoria Langland traces a gradual, uneven shift in how they constructed, defended, and redefined their right to political participation, from emphasizing class, race, and gender privileges to organizing around other institutional and symbolic forms of political authority. Embodying Cold War political and gendered tensions, Brazil's increasingly violent military government mounted fierce challenges to student political activity just as students were beginning to see themselves as representing an otherwise demobilized civil society. By challenging the students' political legitimacy at a pivotal moment, the dictatorship helped to ignite the student protests that exploded in 1968. In her attentive exploration of the years after 1968, Langland analyzes what the demonstrations of that year meant to later generations of Brazilian students, revealing how student activists mobilized collective memories in their subsequent political struggles.

Full Product Details

9780822353126

Table of Contents

Reviews

Clear, concise, and full of engaging and dramatic stories, Victoria Langland's Speaking of Flowers is an important contribution to our understanding of the history of the Brazilian student movement and its vital role in twentieth-century politics. In addition, through her analysis of the constructed memories of 1968, Langland provides readers an excellent opportunity to consider a series of methodological questions about how history is written and how Brazilians have shaped the recollection of that history. --James N. Green, author of We Cannot Remain Silent: Opposition to the Brazilian Military Dictatorship in the United States

Author Information

Victoria Langland is Assistant Professor of History at the University of California, Davis.

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available