Language Policies of the Estado Novo and Biopower: the Issue of the Languages of Italian Immigrants in Santa Catarina

Abstract

The present article discusses the linguistic policies of the Estado Novo (New State) and its control mechanisms, especially with regards to the Italian languages spoken by Italian immigrants and their descendants in Santa Catarina, based on the perspective of the concept of Biopolitics (FOUCAULT, 2005). The project of nationalization developed by Estado Novo has created the image of a common enemy, the foreigner, and one of the policies applied during that time was the foreign languages prohibition. This paper aims to show how the State intervenes not only with the creation of laws, but also by means of control and surveillance mechanisms that spread among individuals, according to the logic of panopticon (FOUCAULT, 1987), which argues that the power directly affects the bodies and produces docile bodies. In the case of the Italian immigrants in Santa Catarina, these policies resulted in the disappearance of several Italian languages brought by immigrants. Furthermore, an enduring negative connotation of the term “colono” was developed, which contributed to the negative image on the descendants of Italian immigrants.