MISSION AND PROFESSION

SÉRGIO BUARQUE DE HOLANDA AS LITERARY CRITICS IN BRAZILIAN PRESS

Abstract

This paper examines Sérgio Buarque de Holanda's work as a literary critic in the Rio de Janeiro press between the 1940s and 1950s. Through an analysis of articles published by the author, the study seeks to understand how his work articulated elements of literary criticism, history, and the social sciences, in a context marked by the process of specialization in these fields of study. The research is based on a wide range of articles, focusing on an approach that highlights the meanings attributed to the idea of scientificity in the field of criticism and the shifts provoked by the emergence of sociology as a form of heuristic knowledge. It argues that literary criticism functioned, during this period, as a privileged space for dialogue between different fields of knowledge, articulated with the emergence of the social sciences as a distinct language in the intellectual landscape. The article thus contributes to a reflection on the ways in which sociology is inserted into the public sphere and the links between literature, the press and the development of social thought in Brazil.