This paper analyzes media discourses on the killing of Evandro João da Silva. Evandro was a leader of Cultural Group AfroReggae and was killed due to reacting to a robbery in Rio de Janeiro, October 2009. The analysis is based upon the interpretation of the Groups' set of strategies for social intervention as a "moral project". This project would have as its main focus the notion of responsibility towards the other. Its discursive development would be done through "moral tales", which would have as its protagonist the survivor, whose emotional mark would be hope. The death of Evandro, however, adds a new character to these tales: the martyr, who would be associated to utopia, rather than to hope. We examine this public opinion scandal as a social drama, a moment in which "society" (in this case Rio de Janeiros' society) discusses itself, or, referring to Geertz (1978), as a ritual, "a story a society tells to itself about itself". This story poses a challenge to GCAR: how to deal with the emergence of a "martyr" in the middle of their "survivors"? Data analyzed is the media coverage of this event in the newspaper O Globo, from October 19th to October 24th, 2009. The analysis focus on the representations of police institutions to be found in the interventions made by social actors who take part in this debate: public authorities, specialists, members of the Group and the newspaper' readers.
Cultural Group AfroReggae; social movements; media discourses; policing; urban violence