LITERATURE TEACHING: JOSÉ SARAMAGO AND THE RHIZOME THEORY

Abstract

　

It is customary in the Literature teaching history, whether in academic or Elementary and High School, a linear, chronological approach of the literary expression in society(ies), following, by and large, the juxtaposition of historical artistic trends, the "Literary Schools". Nevertheless, it is possible to notice that although the authentic acknowledgment of this approach, it distances Literature from the students’ real world, leaving over a short space to Contemporary Literature studies. On the counterpart, the rhizome theory emerges out of the intellectual universe, with Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s propositions, refuting Modern Science methodologies and guiding sources; expanding the teaching and the scientific spirit range of perceptions, the authors propose a flat interpretation, tangled and rhizomatic, of knowledge, instead of the vertical, dichotomical approach. This way, our paper aims at analyzing how Deleuze and Guattari’s propositions may be applied, transposed into Literature teaching, mainly Contemporary, and, more specifically, to Portuguese writer José Saramago, one of the most

important authors in Portuguese language, artistically recognized worldwide, but little known by adolescents students-readers.