Various Stories Collection, produced by Cecult and published by Editora da Unicamp, completes two decades of editorial success
Twenty years ago, a project initiated by the Center for Research in the Social History of Culture (Cecult) together with Editora da Unicamp would become a historiographical reference and editorial collection. The Various Stories collection was born.
“A few years after Cecult was created, when the first results of collective projects began to appear, we felt the need to create a dissemination channel for the dissertations and theses that were being written within the scope of these projects”, explains Silvia Lara, professor at the department of History at Unicamp and one of the creators of the project.
Like almost every project of this nature, it faced its initial and particular challenges, such as procedures with the publisher, the issue of financial resources for its viability, in addition to holding a competition with an external panel and support for the production of the works, which meant that The published books went through a rigorous selection process, which, combined with advisors from Fapesp (which financed part of the collection), resulted in excellent quality material.
The success and relevance of the collection are justified by its editorial project, which aims to publish themes that are extremely relevant to understanding the History of Brazil. “These are themes that deal with social movements, the history of work, slavery, the history of racism in Brazil. So, the collection deals with themes with specific themes in Social History”, says the current coordinator of the collection, Rodrigo Camargo de Godoi, also a professor in the History department.
In these twenty years, Various Stories has achieved significant numbers that attest to its relevance in Brazilian historiography, as well as the high quality of Cecult's production. 46 titles have already been published and the forty-seventh is already being prepared. Of these 46, nine are collections and the rest are authorial titles.
One of the main assets of the collection's longevity is the topicality of the themes covered, even though some of the titles were published two decades ago. This makes it an important collection not only at the university, but also beyond its walls. “Because it deals with these themes (of Social History), it dialogues a lot with civil society, with social movements, with religions. The collection provides this space for dialogue with a much wider audience”, points out Godoi.
Impact of the collection and its audience
It is not so simple to measure the success and historiographic impact of a collection like Various Stories. However, some numbers can give an idea of the size of the collection.
“We have several indications of the importance of Various Stories and of it, in a way, being considered an achievement in the Brazilian Human Sciences publishing market. In addition to longevity and the number of collections, the number of reviews is an indication. In absolute numbers, there are 112 reviews distributed both in mainstream newspapers and in academic, specialized and very important magazines both in Brazil and abroad”, assesses the collection coordinator.
Another indication of the quality of the collection is its adoption as reading in undergraduate and postgraduate courses in other areas of knowledge, in addition, obviously, to History. Many titles, among them, Rights and Justice in Brazil: Social History essays (org. by Joseli Maria Mendonça and Silvia Lara), became bibliography in law schools, for example.
The collection also stands out for not being intended just for academics, as the works are designed to be read by a diverse audience. “A non-specialized person, but who likes books and is interested in important topics, such as the history of labor justice in Brazil, workers' struggles, religiosity, racism, the press in Brazil. So it dialogues with important themes that are burning in Brazilian society today, at a time when we see a systematic attack on the rights that workers have achieved in recent decades”, explains Godoi.
Among many themes presented, the theme on Social History of Africa was recently inaugurated in the collection with the work Doctor-priestesses: ancestral religiosities and contestation in southern Mozambique, by Jacimara Souza Santana, forty-sixth work to be included in Various Stories. The forty-seventh, already in production, continues this theme with the title Margins and Oceans: chapters in the social history of Africa, organized by professor Lucilene Reginaldo, from the History department at Unicamp, and professor Roquinaldo Ferreira, from the University of Pennsylvania (USA). The collection takes stock of the historiographical production on Africa produced in Brazil, which has a very large impact on this field of studies.
Challenges in an anti-science country
Brazil, but not only (it must be emphasized!), is going through a delicate moment in terms of scientific knowledge. Denial of scientific data, methods, cuts in research budgets, as well as defamatory attacks are some of the current enemies of scientific production. And, in this context, the Humanities are the areas of knowledge most attacked, since they are responsible for thinking about society critically.
Added to this scenario is a crisis that the publishing market is going through. In this scenario, what challenges does Various Stories face?
Silvia Lara draws attention, with trepidation, to the panorama that Brazil is experiencing. “This year, all of this was aggravated by attacks on science and scientific production, promoted by people with authoritarian ideological projects, who today occupy positions of power. And the challenge became even more pressing. Institutional spaces are being restricted and the most common academic activities are increasingly at risk of being paralyzed; censorship of free thought (essential for the Humanities) is spreading across several instances, practically at the same intensity and at the same time as belief in absurd statements are taken as truth”.
Given the context presented, Various History faces a challenge that is not restricted to itself, but is a situation extended to all scientific knowledge produced in Brazil. “It is the challenge of the Brazilian university, of the production of historical knowledge in Brazil, of the continuity of the production of Science in Brazil. Scientific dissemination will not make sense if there is no production of Science. At this moment, this is not just the challenge of Various Stories, but it belongs to all of us”, adds Godoi.
Amid this horizon of uncertainty, Cecult's production of knowledge continues to enrich Brazilian historiography. Producing Science, at this moment, is an act of resistance.
You can find Various Stories in the main bookstores in Brazil and also on the website of Unicamp Publisher.
