Luís da Câmara Cascudo: itinerário de um pensador

Abstract

The following thesis presents a study of the intellectual and personal profile of Luís da Câmara Cascudo (1898-1986) in the background of his hometown, Natal, Brazil, where he was born and grew up. It depicts the spoilt child, the narcissistic young man (the prince of Tirol) and the multifaceted professional who, in spite of his many other roles, would rather regard himself as a teacher. The shape of such an outline is rooted in recollections from memory, history, folklore and ethnography from the point of view of a core unit with emphasis to that one aspect which distinguished and made known Cascudo's work: his contribution to the study of folklore. His intellectual production comprises 150 books published, over 3.000 articles and chronicles and a collection of approximately 1.500 letters out of which only a few are available to researchers. Moreover, the process of creation of his texts written after an essay style which combines logic, rational, mythic and symbolic thought is analyzed; the performance of this role in cultural exchange and his reception of modernist ideas are approached; the sources for data used for the present work are identified and emphasis is given to those Cascudo favored