“IT’S A SHAME YOU’RE BLACK”: SOCIAL REPRESENTATIONS OF BLACK WOMEN AND CAROLINA’S REBELLIOUS WORDS

Abstract

Even after the event known as the Abolition of Slavery, racist practices persist, and representations circulating in the social imagination continue to highlight the notion of white superiority, especially male superiority. Black women are seen as inferior, dirty, and incapable. Amidst this reality, Carolina Maria de Jesus emerges with a subversive discourse that represents many Black voices, as Black women's existence is collective. She carries within her body multiple struggles, symbols of resistance. Thus, this work aims to reflect on how Carolina's self-representation, especially in Quarto de despejo: diário de uma favelada (2014), contributes to the resistance and affirmation of Black female identity. To this end, this work draws theoretically from authors such as Almeida (2020), Santos (2002), Ribeiro (2018), and Kilomba (2019), among others.