As The visual narratives on the War of Paraguay in Diabo Coxo

Abstract

The War of Paraguay between 1864 and 1870 intensified the social, political, cultural and economic problems latent in the Second Reign of D. Pedro II. To observe the conception of certain liberal social segments of Brazil Empire on the beginning of the military confrontation, the political preparation in the recruitment and in the enlistment, administrative and structural organization of the army, national identity and civic duty, we used as a primary source the magazine Diabo Coxo, published in São Paulo between 1864 and 1865. The caricatures published in the newspaper of São Paulo narrated to that society, mostly illiterate, the main military actions, the challenges faced at the front, the political and administrative measures of the Brazilian central and local government vis-à-vis the Paraguayan invaders, which constitutes an important object of study to understand the discursive attacks and the conditions experienced by the different social groups in the to run of war.