Cultura e representações da paisagem cajueira no Nordeste do Brasil: dimensões geoeducacionais de uma tropicalidade frutífera

Abstract

Understanding geographic space requires more than sight; it requires smelling, touching, listening, tasting, imagining, and feeling. The expressions of cashew in everyday life reveal a true polyphony of landscape, and the relationship with this fruit dates back to ancient times. This research was based on the hypothesis that knowledge of cashew landscapes fosters a rich geographical understanding, manifested through literature, cuisine, music, and visual arts. As a general objective, we sought to understand its multiple representations through an analysis of the spatial dynamics of the cashew landscape in the states of Ceará, Piauí, and Rio Grande do Norte. This research was motivated by the lack of systematization and organization of knowledge surrounding the history of cashew, which is scattered across many media and lacks updated interpretations of what cashew represents today in its different cultural manifestations. To this end, we designed specific objectives to achieve this goal. Our specific objectives were: 1) To investigate how food culture constitutes cultural heritage; 2) To research the spatial dynamics of cashew in the local, regional, national, and global context; 3) To analyze the geographies of cashew; and 4) To discuss the role of geoeducation through Food Heritage Education. This research is qualitative and quantitative and exploratory in nature, involving bibliographical readings, surveys of cashew landscapes, planning and conducting fieldwork, and the development of a geoeducational product. The method used was semiotic, based on the concepts of Charles Sanders Peirce. We consider cashew as a fruit that symbolizes polysemic tropicality, reinforcing the nutritional potential strongly identified in the Northeastern and Brazilian landscapes; in addition, it reaches a global scale through complex cultural phenomena. These phenomena demonstrate the central perspective of this thesis: the networked articulation of a tropical cashew landscape, accessible to geographic education, aggregates values and promotes social identities capable of shaping a Cashew Cultural Region (CCR). It is through the integration of multiple cajualities (cashew events and festivities) that the CCR is formed, blending tradition and innovation. Proposing this concept to reflect on public policy related to cashew food heritage is the objective of this research.