Vidas Secas and the relations of rural degrading work in contemporary Brazil

Abstract

This work explores the fictional depiction of the farm worker, in Vidas secas, by Brazilian novelist Graciliano Ramos, in dialogue with a contemporary labor reality in rural areas, based on a series of conventional sources of labor law in Brazil. As for the procedures applied, this is a theoretical and interdisciplinary research with a predominantly qualitative character, and a primarily bibliographic nature. By means of a concatenation of the data obtained in both fields of knowledge/culture – law and literature –, theoretical, analytical and critical arguments were made. An attempt was made to raise reflections on the facts presented in the literary work and their resemblance with the current Brazilian reality mainly concerning slave labor and employer-employee deals.