Ridiculous Incoherence?: Race and Slavery in the Court’s Illustrated Press - 1884-1886

ABSTRACT

The illustrated press of the court in the second half of the Nineteenth century, besides entertaining its readers, participated in the political debate. But how did it do so? This article offers an answer to that question through the analysis of a single image, which, published in the Revista Illustrada in July 1884, comments on the parliamentary debates about the Dantas project. I argue that, through a well-woven composition of elements, the print produces a false argument, a deliberate lie. With such a procedure, it makes a self-praise aiming to distinguish the kind of periodism it practiced and its authors, white people and aligned with a strand of abolitionism.

Keywords:
Illustrated Press; Rio de Janeiro; Race; Slavery; Lie