Weavers of Verses: Alterity and Resistance in the Cordel Literature of Black Women from Sergipe

Abstract

This article examines the poetics of insurgency in contemporary cordel literature through the trajectories of the Sergipe-based cordelistas Izabel Nascimento and Daniela Bento. It analyzes how these Black women authors redefine the genre, turning verse into a site of alterity and political resistance. The theoretical framework brings together Black feminist thought and critical historiography of cordel, challenging the androcentric canon in favor of dissident narratives of race, gender, and territoriality. Methodologically, the study adopts trajectory-based and life-history approaches, drawing on in-depth interviews that reveal an organic writing practice — from early experiments on fabric scraps and letter writing to contemporary productions that now inhabit and subvert digital environments. The findings show that Black women’s authorship in cordel operates as literary insubordination, where ancestral memory and affect converge to confront historical silencing and assert a leading role within spaces of power and circulation in the cordel field. By articulating situated knowledge and poetic performance, Izabel and Daniela reaffirm cordel as a practice of re-existence.