Protagonismo negro em cena: sujeito, ideologia e resistência - uma análise discursiva de For Life

Abstract

This research analyzes the discursive functioning of stereotypes about the Black population in the American television series For Life, examining how these crystallized meanings are discursively stabilized or challenged within the fictional narrative. The series features a Black protagonist who simultaneously occupies the positions of lawyer and incarcerated man, raising the question of how certain stereotypes may be reproduced or displaced in his discourse, given that American television often circulates representations that associate Black subjects with criminality and marginality. The aim of this study is to understand the meaning effects produced in the discourse of the character Aaron Wallace, the Black protagonist of the series, observing how these effects reveal the ideological processes constitutive of the subject and the (re)production of stereotypes about the Black population. The study is grounded in the materialist perspective of Discourse Analysis (DA), drawing on the work of Michel Pêcheux and Eni Orlandi, and articulating the notions of ideology, subject, conditions of production, and discursive formation. The notion of stereotype is examined in relation to the concept of the pre-constructed. The analysis consists of the description and interpretation of utterances and material composition present in several of the thirteen episodes of the series’ first season, considering the conditions of production inherent to television narrative and its ideological crossings. The results indicate that the protagonist’s discourse, affected by contradictory positions and by discursive formations in dispute, reveals both the persistence and the displacement of historically constructed stereotypes about Black men. The observed effects, understood through the pecheutian discursive perspective, shed light on traces of the forms of struggle and resistance enacted by the Black subject within the discursive formation of Blackness. Furthermore, this research addresses specific issues concerning fictional television series related to ethnic-racial discussions, seeking to contribute to broader reflections on this topic.