Social Life and the Deaths of Brazilian Street Children

Resumo

es

O presente texto analisa as práticas funerárias de um grupo de meninos de rua, a fim de sugerir que no ato de providenciar um enterro digno a outros meninos de rua que já faleceriam, os sobreviventes, que vivem nas ruas e fora das parâmetros da infância normativa, exigir o reconhecimento de humanidade não só da pessoa falecido, mas também de todas as pessoas que participam no enterro.

Abstract

en

This article examines mortuary practices of a group of Brazilian street children.¹ One of the few ways that children who live on the streets, and outside the strictures of normative childhood, recognize the humanity of their peers and demand recognition of their own humanity is by providing a proper, dignified burial to other street children who have died. Through the examination of the preparations for a particular funeral, this work argues that, contrary to the beliefs of adults who consider ritualized burials for children who live on the streets to be wasteful, funeral ceremonies provide street children with much needed opportunities to assert their membership in the human community, and to demand that their lives be recognized as having intrinsic value.