Brazil: Portuguese Language Museum celebrated language’s international day

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – On May 5, the Museum of the Portuguese Language celebrated the international day in honor of the language with a special program. With free and on-site activities, shows, performances, debate tables, book launches, and readings of literary works, the museum is located in Estação da Luz in São Paulo City, and the program runs until Saturday, May 7. The event will also have presentations in the central lobby of Companhia Paulista de Trens Metropolitanos (CPTM), interacting with the circulating public.

“A program that reflects several issues involving the Brazilian Portuguese language was composed in terms of education, philology, anthropology, and politics. The encounters of the Portuguese language and its colonizing army with the African languages, the native languages, everything that we have to understand better even to be similar to what this country is,” says Felipe Hirsch, who was invited to create a program inspired by the theater play “Brazilian Language”.

Lia de Itamaracá, Ailton Krenak, Pilar del Río, Juçara Marçal, Milton Hatoum, and Kiko Dinucci are some of the event’s guests.

“This is what this program does: we will talk about indigenous female leaders, we will talk about African languages within our culture, in short, all these encounters that make Brazil a splendorous place, but also a place that is beset by various humanitarian tragedies,” adds the curator. He points out that, besides the political dimension, the program contemplates the “creative order of these thinkers, artists, who will be there.”

On the second day of the event, the programming starts at noon, in the central lobby of CPTM, with the performance “Zion Gate Sound System and Santa Cruz Battle – Rhythm and Poetry in Gare da Luz”. At 2 PM, the panel “Experimenting with Language” brings together writer Veronica Stigger and philosopher Juliano Pessanha. At 5:30 PM, the indigenous rights activist Ailton Krenak presents his thoughts about the life of riverine and indigenous communities in contemporary Brazil at the panel “The Idea of Nation”.

To close the event on Friday, there will be a presentation by Lia de Itamaracá with the show “Ciranda Sem Fim”. The performance will feature DJ Dolores at Praça da Língua.

On Saturday, May 7, the activities begin at 11 AM with the opening of the installation “O Conto da Ilha desconhecida” (The Tale of the Undiscovered Island). There is a concert by Orquestra Mundana Refugi at CPTM’s lobby at noon. At 1 PM, the performance “Ciranda do Gatilho: Caixa Preta” will be presented in the mini auditorium. Throughout the afternoon, debates will discuss the various Portuguese languages and the “glotocide,” which is the diffusion of a new language in a region, weakening the area’s natural one. The evening ends with a show with scenes and music from the play “Brazilian Language” by Felipe Hirsch in collaboration with the Ultralíricos collective.

To participate in the free-of-charge activities, tickets must be picked up in advance at the ticket office in Lobby B starting at noon each day. It is mandatory to present the covid-19 vaccine passport before entering the museum for all people five years old and older.

The tables will be broadcast live on Youtube and Facebook of the Museu da Língua Portuguesa, with hand-sign interpretation.

With information from Agência Brasil