STATIC MACAO AND MACAO IN TRANSITION IN THE SHORT STORIES OF A MACANESE WOMAN一位土生葡人女作家筆下的靜態與變遷中的澳門
The article analyzes the representation of “static Macao” and “Macao in transition” in the short story collection **Cheong-Sam – A Cabaia**, by **Deolinda da Conceição**, the first Macanese female journalist and an author whose writing bears witness, across decades, to the political-cultural instabi...
Saved in:
| Published in: | Review of Culture |
|---|---|
| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Articles |
| Published: |
Instituto Cultural de Macau
January 2009
|
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.icm.gov.mo/rc/viewer/pdfViewerParts/40029/3629 |
| Summary: | The article analyzes the representation of “static Macao” and “Macao in transition” in the short story collection **Cheong-Sam – A Cabaia**, by **Deolinda da Conceição**, the first Macanese female journalist and an author whose writing bears witness, across decades, to the political-cultural instability of the “Near East”: from the Sino-Japanese turbulence to the experience of exile. Proceeding from the premise that no culture is immutable—rather, it evolves through slow processes—the author redefines “static” as **background** and **scenery** (photography, landscape, and tradition), while “transition” operates as the **narrative engine** of action.
Methodologically, the study focuses on a **localized corpus**: stories in which Macao is explicitly the setting (“O Calvário de Lin Fong”, “Os Sapatinhos Bordados da Anui”, and “Fome”), while also mobilizing narratives with a likelihood of local framing. The reading emphasizes how pictorial descriptions and cultural practices produce a sense of permanence, even as war, social displacement, and historical changes reconfigure characters, memories, and ways of life.
The conclusion is that, in Deolinda’s stories, the city appears less as a “fixed place” than as a **palimpsest**: the static image sustains the contrast with transformation, revealing a Macanese identity constructed between familial continuity and historical rupture. |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 1682-1106 |