Discursos em cinzas: olhares sobre as representações identitárias de fumantes segundo discursos institucionais

Abstract

Understanding the aspects of the contemporary world is to fall on a complex system of multiple relationships, which sets up the most diverse views about reality from speeches. With these theoretical assumptions - based on Symbolic Interaction and Cultural Studies - the role of organizations and the way in which they position themselves discursively in the social environment (through communication practices) become possible approaches to the understanding of the contemporary scenario. Thus, we see smoking as a major theme of our time. The tobacco culture, which can be understood from planting to forms of consumption, incorporates historic moments since before the Age of Discovery, and lasts until the present day. This study aims to investigate the ways in which organizations such as Souza Cruz (Brazilian producer of manufactured cigarettes) and the Ministry of Health (government representative) set out, in their institutional speeches, public representations about the identity of smokers. Using discourse analysis as methodology - in the theoretical understanding of Mikhail Bakhtin - we analyze the institutional texts of the two organizations investigating enunciative aspects that represent publicly the "reality" of smokers. Then, applying the method of Focus Group we measure the speeches of the smokers themselves about the condition of consumers, then analyzed with the same standards established for the organizations. Our goal is to find approaches and departures between the discourses that are constituted by dialogue and configure possible understandings of reality.