November 8th to 11th, 2004

Fernanda Carlos Borges
nandacarlos@uol.com.br
PUC - SP - Brazil

THE ETHICS OF REVENGE IN OSWALD DE ANDRADE'S PHILOSOPHY OF DIFERENCE

ABSTRACT
Accouding to Oswald de Andrade "the metaphysical operation which is linked to the antropophagic rite is that of trnsforming taboo into a totem. From the opposite value to the favourable value"(ANDRADE. 1995, pg.101). Differently from the ideals of civilization where "there is something coercive - it can be expressed in commandments and sentences"(ANDRADE. 1995, pg.158). Which is a caracteristic of the world "attached to the net of the alexandrin civilization, which conceives as ideals the theorical man"(NIETZSCHE. 1996, pg.40).
Oswald conceives a society where "the closer we get to agriculture, and more impressive is the female power (...) the values of life beat the fascination to death (BADINTER. 1986, pg.62). Driven by difference, whose ethical expression is the right of revenge: "the tupi and african paganism survive (...) like the old right of revenge in the tribal tupi society"(ANDRADE. 1995, pg.17). They don't assume that the enemy is insufficiently good (ingnorant), or the contrary of good (lier), which implies the right of defense and understanding, because the antropophagist "conceives life as a devouring process and symbolizes it in the antropophagic rite which is communion" (ANDRADE. 1995, pg.159). We can imagine a "system founded on intercommunication, and not on coercion, a policentric and not monocentric system (...) a system that increases its evolting, inventive, organizing capacities with the decrease of its restrictions"( MORIN. 1973, pg.187). Oswald announced that this system would be able to develop in the "Pindorama matriarchy"(ANDRADE. 1995, pg.50).

KEYWORDS: Antropophagic, Revenge, Ethics, Understanding.

Center for Pragmatism Studies
Philosophy Graduate Program
Departament of Philosophy
Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo - Brazil