CONCEPTUAL BLENDING PROCESSES IN NEOLOGISMS OF THE BOOK-REPORTAGE BANZEIRO ÒKÒTÓ: A FUNCTIONAL-COGNITIVE LINGUISTIC APPROACH

Abstract

This paper aims to analyze the neologisms created and/or resignified by Eliane Brum in her work Banzeiro Òkòtó: uma viagem à Amazônia centro do mundo (2021), considering them as mechanisms for producing identity meaning and strategies of discursive resistance. Based on the understanding that language is not just a neutral instrument of communication, but rather a means of constructing worlds and subjectivities, we propose to investigate how the neologisms used by Brum contribute to reinforcing Amazonian identity and highlighting the sociopolitical and environmental conflicts that plague the Xingu region, particularly those resulting from the construction of the Belo Monte Hydroelectric Power Plant. In this sense, the work in question transcends the genre of a reportage book, configuring itself as a literary-political manifesto that articulates denunciation, memory, and affectivity. In this way, it becomes a fertile field for reflecting on the relationships between language, territory, and identity. In view of this, the relevance of this study is justified by the transformative potential of the language used by Brum, whose writing, marked by a simultaneously poetic and political engagement, contributes to giving visibility to the historically silenced voices of the Amazon, as well as to denouncing the predatory effects of human action on the environment and indigenous peoples. From this perspective, the understanding of neologisms as marks of an authorship that resists colonial and utilitarian discourses proves essential to deepen the debates on the literary representation of the Amazon space and its relationship with the processes of belonging, displacement and resistance. Regarding the methodological path, a qualitative approach was adopted, based on the assumptions of functional linguistics, represented by authors such as Michael Halliday (1989), Maria Helena de Moura Neves (1997) and Rosangela Sousa (2015); and cognitive linguistics, based on the contributions of Lilian Ferrari (2010); The concept of neologism, in turn, is treated according to the studies of Nelly Medeiros de Carvalho (2010) and Maria Ieda Alves (2007). The analysis was conducted through a careful reading of the work, with the selection of excerpts in which innovative lexical formations or resignifications of existing terms occur. In which each occurrence was interpreted in light of the social, cultural and political context inserted, seeking to understand its effects of meaning and its discursive functions. As a result, it was found that the neologisms present in Banzeiro Òkòtó not only enrich the literary text, but also operate as instruments of symbolic struggle and identity affirmation. In addition to condensing collective and individual experiences, they articulate ancestral knowledge and local knowledge, establishing a language of their own that challenges the hegemonic ways of naming the Amazonian reality. It is therefore concluded that the use of these linguistic resources is central to the author's proposal to shift the axis of looking at the Amazon, transforming it into a narrative and political center, a space where language is established as a territory in constant dispute.