Everyone's love, seed words to change the world:

grammars of resistance and therapeutic practices of the social use of language by cultural collectives from the periphery in times of health crisis

Abstract

This article focuses on the production of a cultural grammar of resistance from the analysis of linguistic practices of collectives in the periphery of Fortaleza, Ceará, experienced in the cartographies of Viva a Palavra, a community outreach and popular education program committed to confrontation of violence through the valorization of the ways of life and self-organized practices of art and culture of peripheral youths. Words-world were generated, in a cartographic research, from the perspective of cultural pragmatics. Such words and their generative themes allowed the analysis of language games, such as culture circles which, although produced remotely, function as therapeutic linguistic practices, in the face of social suffering, aggravated by the Covid 19 pandemic. In this study, Paulo Freire's concepts of word-world were articulated with Wittgenstein's concepts of language games and language therapy. Also central are Veena Das' works on social suffering and cultural grammar. The analysis shows the effects of violence on the socialities of peripheral groups and the linguistic practices of resistance to violence in the current global health crisis.