Esquerda, direita e o politicamente correto: breve estudo comparado

Abstract

By analyzing the semantic structure of the concept of political correctness in the context of its emergence and development in the United States, and comparing it to a brief history of the concept in Brazil, we identify the main meanings attributed to it and the main political forces making use of it. Two moments of the debate on political correctness in our country were chosen for our analysis: the debate on the attempt to legally ban the book As caçadas de Pedrinho in the beginning of this decade, and today’s social networking web pages on the issue of political correctness. We seek to show there is a strong similarity between the development of the concept in the USA and in Brazil; and that in our country there is a continuance between the two studied moments that is grounded on the definition of political correctness as an authoritarian imposition from the left-wing ideology of PT, the Worker’s Party