Dante de Laytano: um diálogo convergente com a obra africanista de Arthur Ramos

Abstract

This research arises on the analysis of the work of Dante de Laytano dedicated to the afro-descendant population from Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. Although the work of Laytano is broad and varied, in relation to black people there are not many texts, therefore important because this historian was a pioneer in the sistematic study of racial relations, concerning black people, in Rio Grande do Sul, after the 1930s. From this, it is possible to observe references to the anthropoligist Arthur Ramos in his analysis. We explored some texts of Laytano trying to identify references to a methodological, conceptual and interpretative arrangement approximated to those categories operated by Arthur Ramos, enriching the discussion in relation to the importance and the innovation that the study about black people represented, in that moment, in Rio Grande do Sul. This is an introductory work in which we approach some elements of approximation. We presented both intellectuals and the conditions in which their ideas crossed and we evidenced the particularities of Ramos influence in contrast with Gilberto Freire’s, to whom it is attributed preponderantly the influence about Laytano, in relation to the study of black people and their culture. Besides, we discussed elements that bring Laytano near the work of Ramos, mainly the concepts of North-American cultural anthropology, as well as the africanization of the “black culture”.