Cambridge Scholars Publishing Toward a Linguistic and Literary Revision of Cultural Paradigms: Common and/or Alien

This book draws an updated Euro-American conceptual map, starting from a limited number of strategic terms whose meanings today are judged univocal and permanent, while in fact daily use has turned them into “common sense”, depriving them of their ambiguity – an original feature of language, particularly relevant when it comes to literary use. By re-examining the proper noun for each of the selected notions, the contributors’ common intent is to shed light on their polysemous nature and linguistic fluidity, in spite of the common tendency towards simplification and homogeneity imposed by hegemonic cultural paradigms. Along this line, the book explores the great divides between identity and otherness (or common or alien) in order to recover a sense of cultural identity which is at once polymorphous and polyphonic. About the Author Ettore Finazzi-Agrò has taught as Full Professor of Portuguese and Brazilian Literature in the Faculty of Humanities at Sapienza University of Rome, Italy, since 1990. He obtained his PhD honoris causa in Literary Theory from Campinas State University, Brazil, in 2014. He is the editor of the journals Letterature d’America and Rivista di Studi Portoghesi e Brasiliani. His publications include Um lugar do tamanho do mundo (2001); Entretempos: mapeando a historia da cultura brasileira (2013); Formas e mediações do trágico moderno. Uma leitura do Brasil (2004); Travessias do pós-trágico. Os dilemas de uma leitura do Brasil (2006); and Possibilidades da nova escrita literária no Brasil (2014).