The Democárcere

the brief break of silencing in prison

Abstract

This article analyzes the conjuncture exposed in a newspaper organized and written by prisoners of the State Penitentiary in São Paulo in the 1980s. This experience was in the opposite direction of the tradition of silencing, segregation and absence of visibility characteristic of the prison. It was one of the few times that a fundamental actor, generally neglected, officially exercised one right of speech: the prisoner, who talked about the prison, about the outside world and about himself. It is this “voice” that we will analyze and position in the midst of a conflictive process of democratic transition.