Do garfo à pena : uma história da alimentação do Rio Grande do Sul a partir de relatos de viajantes oitocentistas

Abstract

This thesis deals with the history of the food of Rio Grande do Sul in the nineteenth century (1817-1858) and seeks to answer how and in what way the food practices of the Rio Grande do Sul were represented in the voyage literature of Nineteenth-century. The main sources of the research are the voyage narratives of Nicolau Dreys, Auguste de Saint-Hilaire, Carl Seidler and Robert Avé-Lallemant, who traveled the Province of Rio Grande do Sul, between 1817 and 1858. Identify and analyse the representations built by these travelers on food practices in the Province, as well to inventory and cartographically demonstrate the activities related to the preparation / work on the land, to the cultivation and consumption of food in the various regions of the Province in Rio Grande do Sul in the nineteenth century, were the objectives of the thesis. The research is based theoretically in the Cultural History and methodologically in the Discursive Textual Analysis, having considered, for the analysis the works of the four travelers, the categories production, preparation and consumption of food; commensality and etiquette [distinction and social stratification at the table]; hospitality, reciprocity and sociability; health and nutrition and symbolic taboos and meanings. In addition to representations about dietary practices and the evidence that they were unequivocally grounded in the social and cultural experiences of those who described them, our analysis of the traveler's narratives made it possible to identify and discuss information about a wide variety of foods produced, practices of cultivation, consumption and sociability, as well as labor relations in the different regions of the Province of Rio Grande do Sul, pointing to the undeniable contribution of these sources to a History of Food of Rio Grande do Sul.