In Argentina and Brazil the modernization of literary criticism in the 1950s and 60s developed in the context of different intellectual traditions and academic organizations. However in both countries, and almost at the same time, literary criticism was renewed through its contact with sociology. To analyze the relationship between these two academic disciplines, this article examines two intellectual trajectories - those of Adolfo Prieto and Antonio Candido - and two cultural magazines - Contorno (1953-1959) and Clima (1941-1944). But although the renewal of literary criticism followed similar paths in both countries, only in Brazil was university-based criticism fully recognized as the foremost intellectual authority over the literary production during the period. In other words, the consolidation of Antonio Candido on the Brazilian cultural scene had no real equivalent in Argentina where neither Adolfo Prieto or any other critic acquired a similar standing. Why? This article explores a possible answer to this question, focusing on the correlation between the consolidation of literary criticism and the decline of the centrality of literature in the cultural world
Field of Knowledge; Intellectual traditions; Academic organizations; Sociology; Literary criticism